Some 50 members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) have withdrawn from Turkey to northern Iraq under the supervision of Turkish security forces, marking the first major movement of the group’s fighters since it announced its decision to lay down arms and disband earlier this year, the pro-government Hürriyet daily reported.
The PKK, designated as a terrorist organization by Turkey and its Western allies, formally renounced its armed campaign against Turkey in May, after four decades of violence that had claimed some 40,000 lives. Its decision came as part of a new peace process launched with the group aimed at ending its armed conflict.
According to Hürriyet 47 PKK militants left the country carrying only light weapons, while heavy arms were left behind in hideouts across southeastern provinces.
The departure of the militants came in the wake of an announcement the PKK made on Sunday, saying that it has begun withdrawing all of its forces from Turkish soil to northern Iraq.
“We are implementing the withdrawal of all our forces within Turkey,” the PKK said in a statement read out in Kurdish and Turkish in a remote village in the Qandil Mountains of northern Iraq.
It was not immediately clear how many fighters would be involved in the withdrawal, but observers estimated it would likely be between 200 to 300.
Security sources told Hürriyet that the withdrawal was coordinated to avoid clashes between the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) and the PKK. Turkish military and intelligence units monitored the process closely, and military forces stationed along the withdrawal routes were relocated to prevent contact with the departing militants.
The report said PKK fighters vacated control points near the Turkish border to minimize the risk of provocation. Turkish security forces, including army, gendarmerie and special operations units, have since launched operations to search the caves and depots the group had used for decades.
For the first time since the PKK launched its armed campaign in 1984, its militants did not establish winter bases inside Turkey.
The renewed peace process with the PKK was initiated in October 2024 by far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli, who publicly called on jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan to urge the militant group to lay down its arms. Öcalan responded in February with a message calling on the PKK to disarm and disband. The militants burned some of their weapons in northern Iraq as a symbolic first step on July 30.