PKK leader gives Makhmour camp residents hope of return
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ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Abdullah Ocalan, jailed leader of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), on Friday said that the nearly 10,000 Kurdish refugees from southeast Turkey living in a camp in northern Iraq will be allowed to return home as Turkey-PKK peace talks progress.
'Undoubtedly, with the progress of this process, our people will once again return to their lands,' Ocalan said in a letter to the camp's residents, the PKK-affiliated Firat news agency reported. 'We must think of return collectively. Within this framework, I convey my greetings to the people of Makhmour.'
Makhmour camp, located southwest of Erbil and administratively part of Nineveh province, was established in 1998 and is home to around 10,000 Kurdish refugees from southeast Turkey, most of whom were displaced during Turkey's conflict with the PKK when their villages were depopulated.
The camp has long been caught in regional tensions. Turkey views it as a PKK stronghold. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in 2021 labeled it an 'incubation center for terrorism' and Turkish air and drone strikes have targeted alleged PKK positions in and around the camp.
'The people of Makhmour have played a very important role in the history of our freedom struggle and hold great value. Despite all these difficulties, through their practical struggle, they have shown that resistance is life,' Ocalan said.
The PKK, which has spent decades fighting Turkey, deployed fighters to protect the camp from Islamic State (ISIS) attacks in 2014 but said they withdrew in October 2023. The group is designated a terrorist organization by Turkey and was officially banned by Iraq last year under pressure from Ankara.
Camp authorities say residents are currently barred from working, accessing hospitals, or enrolling in universities, and many have been unable to renew expired refugee documents, preventing them from passing through checkpoints.
Murat Karayilan, a top PKK commander, on Friday called on the Iraqi government to lift its 'siege' on the camp and warned that if it continues, the PKK will be forced to return.
'It should be known that if this approach to the camp continues, we will be forced to intervene again and send guerillas there again,' Karayilan told PKK-affiliated Sterk TV.
'We do not accept these inhumane practices and will not remain silent,' he said, calling on Iraqi President Abdul Latif Rashid to address the issue.
The PKK Kurdish group held a ceremonial disarmament in the Kurdistan Region on July 11, when 30 members and commanders burned their weapons, acting on Ocalan's call to abandon their armed struggle after four decades and pursue a political solution to secure Kurdish rights in Turkey.
A Turkish parliamentary commission tasked with establishing a legal framework for the peace process has been established and on Friday had its second meeting.
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