HDP MP: Erdogan is not ready for peace
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan24) – A pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HPD) member of the Turkish Parliament said on Friday that Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was not ready for making peace with the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
MP Imam Tascier who is a representative of the de facto Kurdish capital of Diyarbakir in Turkey talked to Kurdistan 24 English in an interview in Erbil during his visit to the Kurdistan Region as a part of an HDP delegation.
The delegation of MPs headed by the HDP Co-chair Selahattin Demirtas has been conducting meetings with Kurdish officials including President Masoud Barzani whom they met on Thursday.
"From the Turkish perspective, there is currently no basis for a new round of peace negotiations with the Kurds," said Tascier adding that Turkey's authorities, particularly President Erdogan, were not "ready" for peace with the Kurds without elaborating further.
Erdogan has repeatedly vowed to continue fighting Kurdish guerrillas until "the last terrorist is killed."
Tascier stated that the imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan continued to pursue a political solution to the ongoing fighting in urban centers and rural areas between the Turkish State the guerrilla group he cofounded.
Two weeks ago, Ocalan labeled the fighting a "blind war" during a prison visit by his younger brother Mehmet Ocalan, calling for a renewal of the peace process and ceasefire that broke down in August 2015.
"A peaceful solution to the Kurdish question is what our party has been demanding since the violence restarted," insisted the HDP MP.
KURDISH NATIONAL UNITY
Asked whether the HDP visit to Southern Kurdistan had anything to do with Ocalan's latest message, Tascier said his party had long been planning to meet with political parties in the "free part of Kurdistan," hoping to create a national consensus among Kurdish factions.
"I saw a very beautiful spirit of unity in the summer of 2013 when I was in Erbil for the preparations of a Kurdish National Congress that would create a united front in addressing our people's plight in all four parts of Kurdistan," said HDP's Tascier.
The 2013 initiative to found a Kurdish National Congress that would encompass all the major factions and parties from the Greater Kurdistan failed over partisan disagreements mainly between the Kurdistan Democratic Party (KDP) and the PKK.
"If we had achieved a unity back then, we would have had one voice that the world, that the United States who supports our fight in Iraq and Syria against the Islamic State, could hear more clearly and take seriously," concluded Tascier.
Editing by Ava Homa