Kurdish insurgents in Türkiye's Kurdish province, put down their weapons after decades of fighting with the government

The Kurdish Group announced on Monday that it would completely disarm and disband and end decades of insurgency with the Turkish state, the FIRAT news agency closely linked to the group. The PKK has long been designated as a terrorist organization by the United States, Türkiye, the European Union, NATO and many other countries and entities.

The landmark move announced on Monday will end the 40-year conflict, killing more than 40,000 people.

The group announced that it had completed its "historical mission" and therefore "resolved to dissolve the organizational structure of the PKK and be managed and executed by Leader Apo (Abdullah Ocalan) (Abdullah Ocalan) and end the approach to the armed struggle."

The group's incarcerated founder and ideological leader, the news is Abdullah Ocalan called In a February open letter, it sent a letter to its leadership asking the PKK to permanently put down its weapons. Workers' Party of Kurdish Announce a unilateral ceasefire next month.

The organization was founded in 1978 with ambition to create an independent home for the large Turkish Kurdish minority, but later abandoned its separatist ambitions and focused on gaining greater rights for the group within Turkish society.

Hatice Levent posted a photo of her daughter Fadime at a party in Diyarbakir.
Hatice Levent holds a picture of her daughter Fadime, who is believed to have joined the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), as families of young people believed to have been recruited by the PKK gather outside the local office of the pro-Kurdish DEM Party, as the PKK announcements plans to disband and end its 40-year Turkey insurgency, in the southeastern city of Diyarbakir, Turkey, May 12, 2025. Sertac Kayare/Reuters

A spokesperson for the Ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan welcomed the news, calling it a "important step towards free terror Turkey."

Spokesperson Omer Celik said the PKK decision should “have “all dimensions and have no flaws and have specific goals”.

However, details about the technology for the group's disbandment were not immediately released, such as what would happen to all the weapons it had for decades, or whether its members would receive legal amnesty in Türkiye.

The PKK in its statement said the issue of Kurdish rights “has reached the point where it could be resolved through democratic politics”, urging the Turkish parliament to play a "historical role" in completing the process.

Erdogan's government has established complex relations with the country's Kurds.

Some progress has been made in restoring Kurdish rights since the AKP came to power in 2002, but dozens of Kurdish rights defenders have also been imprisoned after the collapse of peace talks in 2015.

The announcement will have greater consequences for the region, especially Iraq, Syria and Iran, all sharing borders with Türkiye and possessing a large number of Kurdish minorities.

The disarmament of the Workers' Democratic Party may also help clear the thorny problems between the United States and NATO allies. Türkiye has long criticized the U.S. support for the Syrian Kurdish group YPG, which Türkiye believes the group's expansion is an expansion of the Workers' Kurdish Party.

YPG and the Allied Kurdish militia were instrumental allies with the United States in Syria’s war against ISIS.