Turkey Moves Jailed PKK Leader Ocalan to New Prison Section Amid Peace Push
Jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan has been moved to a newly built section of the Imrali island prison where he has been held since 1999, a senior DEM Party official said, calling the move a reason to speed up the stalled peace process.
Turkey has moved jailed Kurdish militant leader Abdullah Ocalan to a newly built section of the island prison where he has been held since 1999, a senior Kurdish official said, as efforts continue to end decades of conflict.
Improving prison conditions for Ocalan, who heads the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, has been a key Kurdish demand in the push to end the 42-year conflict between the militant group and Turkish authorities.
Mithat Sancar, a lawmaker for the pro-Kurdish DEM Party, confirmed Ocalan's relocation in an interview with Medya Haber TV on Saturday, without providing further details. He did not confirm that the newly built section has better accommodations, though his remarks appeared to indicate that.
Sancar also called for the peace process to be sped up, saying it had been on "a pause" for the last two months. Ocalan's move to the new facility, he said, "necessitates an acceleration of the process." He stressed that Ocalan must coordinate peace negotiations, adding that the process "cannot proceed with unilateral expectations and demands" and urging the Turkish government to "move away from its insistent and rigid stance."
Sancar is among a group of DEM Party politicians who have been regularly visiting Ocalan since the militant leader called on the PKK to disband and disarm in February 2025. Three months later, the PKK announced it would lay down its arms and end hostilities, and in August Turkey's parliament approved legislation offering a conditional pardon to thousands of PKK fighters, which President Recep Tayyip Erdogan signed into law.
Ocalan has been imprisoned in a penitentiary on the island of Imrali in the Marmara Sea since his capture in 1999. He remains an influential figure among Kurds and is seen as key to advancing the peace process. The conflict with the PKK - designated a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union - has killed tens of thousands of people since 1984.