The Kurdistan Workers' Party said on Sunday, October 26, 2025, that it is withdrawing its fighters from Turkey to northern Iraq in what it described as a step meant to support an ongoing peace effort with the Turkish government.
The announcement was delivered in the Qandil area of northern Iraq and followed a symbolic disarmament ceremony months earlier, when a group of PKK fighters began laying down weapons to demonstrate support for the process. The group has spent decades fighting the Turkish state, and the conflict has killed tens of thousands of people since the 1980s.
In a news conference, Sabri Ok, a member of the Kurdistan Communities Union, said all PKK forces in Turkey were being moved to areas in northern Iraq to avoid clashes or provocations. He said the withdrawal had the approval of Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned PKK leader who has been held on an island near Istanbul since 1999. Vejin Dersim, from the PKK's women's wing, read a statement in Kurdish.
The statement framed the move as a unilateral confidence-building step, while also pressing the Turkish state for legal and political concessions. It said the group remained committed to the decisions of its 12th congress, but argued that those decisions could only be implemented if certain political and legal approaches were adopted.
The AP reported that about 25 fighters who had recently arrived from Turkey were present at the news conference. The group announced in May that it would disband and renounce armed conflict, ending four decades of hostilities, after Ocalan called in February for the PKK to convene a congress and formally disband and disarm.
The Turkish government welcomed the announcement as progress in a wider security and peace process. Omer Celik, spokesman for President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's ruling party, called the move a concrete result of the government's 'Terror-free Turkey' roadmap and warned against efforts to sabotage the process. Efkan Ala, a ruling party deputy chairman, described it as another significant phase in the elimination of terrorism.
Sunday's announcement came days before Erdogan was due to hold his third meeting with Kurdish legislators who have been in talks with Ocalan on Imrali island. A separate 51-member parliamentary committee formed in August is tasked with proposing and supervising legal and political reforms tied to the peace process.
The PKK said the withdrawal was meant to show that it was serious about moving the process forward. But spokesman Zagros Hiwa also criticized Ankara for not taking parallel steps, saying Kurdish still had not been allowed in parliament and that Ocalan's conditions had not improved. Nuda Arin, one of the fighters present, said the group was ready to follow Ocalan's word and do what was needed to make the process succeed.
The PKK is designated a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union. Previous peace efforts between Ankara and the group, including one that collapsed in 2015, have failed.
