Turkey's pro-Kurdish DEM party on Monday hailed the withdrawal of PKK fighters from Turkish soil as a "critical" step that completed the first phase of Ankara's peace process with the Kurdish militants.
The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has pursued four decades of violence against the government, began withdrawing its forces on Sunday, urging Turkey to take the necessary legal steps to advance the process that began a year ago when Ankara offered an olive branch to its jailed leader, Abdullah Öcalan.
"This decision to withdraw is the most concrete expression of (the PKK's) resolve on the path to peace," DEM co-chair Tuncer Bakirhan told reporters, describing it as "one of the most critical and significant steps."
"At this point, the first phase of the (peace) process has concluded," he said, urging the government to press ahead with the "critical and vital second phase ... (of) legal and political steps."
"Parliament must facilitate and develop this process. Legal arrangements must be made for the transition period. These will not only be technical arrangements; they will be the building blocks of peace," he said.
"A solution to the Kurdish issue means the democratization of Turkey; we all win."
Indirect talks with the PKK began late last year with the backing of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, with DEM, Turkey's third-biggest party, playing a key role in facilitating the emerging agreement.
It has said it will meet with Erdogan on Thursday.
Turkey has set up a parliamentary commission to lay the groundwork for the peace process and prepare a legal framework for the political integration of the PKK and its fighters.
A senior PKK leader said Sunday it was essential the commission "immediately" meet Öcalan, whose historic call in February led to his fighters’ decision in May to renounce the armed struggle, drawing a line under four decades of violence that had claimed some 50,000 lives.
It also urged Turkey to take the necessary legal steps to regulate the fate of those who renounce the armed struggle.
AFP
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