 recent decision to end its four-decade-long war in the country’s southeast, Bloomberg reported.){kind=link}
Turkey expects to reap significant economic benefits following the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party’s (PKK) recent decision to end its four-decade-long war in the country’s southeast, Bloomberg reported.
Treasury and Finance Minister Mehmet Şimşek said Tuesday that the conflict, which began in 1984, has cost Turkey an estimated $1.8 trillion.
“We have wasted almost $1.8 trillion in the past five decades combating terror,” Şimşek said during a panel discussion at the Qatar Economic Forum in Doha, citing an unnamed study. He explained that the figure includes not only direct military expenditures but also opportunity costs, the economic gains that failed to materialize because of resources diverted to the conflict.
It’s far beyond what Turkey has said it spent on defense materiel since the PKK’s rebellion turned violent, more than four decades ago.
The PKK, designated as a terrorist group by Turkey and its Western allies, has waged an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984 that cost more than 40,000 lives. It announced its dissolution in a historic move on May 12 following peace talks conducted with its jailed leader, Abdullah Öcalan, who called on the group in February to end the armed conflict.
The PKK is one of several armed Kurdish militant groups active in neighboring states. In Syria, groups seen by Turkey as PKK-affiliated have been backed by the US for nearly a decade to defeat the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant.
Turkey is negotiating with Washington to curb the activities of Kurdish militants there, now that Syria is run by a new administration following the ouster of its long-time strongman leader Bashar al-Assad. The government in Ankara sees great financial gains in Syria’s reconstruction, where Turkish companies are expected to take on projects.