The PKK and the Kurdish Cause: “From the Myth of Liberation to Conflict Within the Kurdish House”

ARK News.. On October 4, writer Botan Derik published an article titled “The Kurdistan Workers’ Party and the Kurdish Cause: From the Myth of Liberation to Conflict Within the Kurdish House?”, arguing that the PKK has moved from the slogan of unifying and liberating Kurdistan to abandoning the dream of a Kurdish state.

The writer is set to publish a 10-part series of articles.

Episode 1

The Kurdistan Workers’ Party and the Kurdish Cause: From the Myth of Liberation to Conflict Within the Kurdish House

For decades, we grew up with a dream that turned out to be nothing more than an illusion and a major lie. We lost those dearest to us. My sister and brother were killed in the Qandil Mountains, without us being able to hold mourning ceremonies for them or even recover their bodies. During the Syrian revolution, I lost my cousin and my maternal uncle, while my son suffered serious injuries. What more are we expected to give?

I moved between various departments of the so-called Autonomous Administration in Hasaka, Raqqa, Deir Ez-Zour, Tabqa, and Manbij. I held many jobs and positions. The common denominator was always that cadres from Turkey or Iran were the ones making the decisions. And their decisions consistently worked against the interests of the Kurds. I often thought they were serving the enemies of the Kurds and their cause. A corrupt official would be released from prison, a drug trafficker would become a prominent member of society, and someone who falsified invoices for Autonomous Administration institutions would be promoted to a higher position.

We saw all of this and turned a blind eye. But what we cannot accept is for all the blood of our martyrs to be sold for a few positions. We cannot tolerate focusing on illusions and repeating lies. Yesterday, I visited the martyrs’ shrine and paid my respects to my family. They told me: “Our blood is cheap, so do whatever you want with us.” You, who grew up in the household of Apo, know everything about them and have seen it with your own eyes. So, bring what is hidden to light, investigate beyond your own network, and do not forget to talk about their selling out of the cause and their creation of conflicts within the Kurdish body.

Let us begin with the first episode:

The Kurdistan Workers’ Party no longer remains what it was when it emerged in the late 1970s. It was founded under the leadership of Abdullah Ocalan on a Marxist-Leninist basis, and its initial objective was to liberate Kurdistan and establish an independent Kurdish state. It used armed struggle and guerrilla warfare to achieve that goal.

Over the years, particularly after Ocalan’s arrest in 1999, the party began revising its ideological project and shifted from the goal of a Kurdish state toward concepts such as the democratic nation, democratic confederalism, and local self-government. In 2025, Ocalan called on the party to end its armed struggle and dissolve itself, and the party later announced decisions aimed at ending the armed conflict.

This is your Ocalan, who sold us out so that he could emerge from what he calls the myth of exile or Imrali. He is living comfortably and pursuing his personal pleasures. In doing so, he betrayed the blood of the martyrs and pursued his own interests with states that oppose nationalist thought.

However, this transformation does not mean that the party’s history can be separated from violations committed by its members during decades of conflict. Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch documented serious abuses committed by the party, including the killing of civilians, the execution of members of the village guards and their families, the killing of government employees and teachers, and attacks against people who did not cooperate with the organization.

Human Rights Watch also documented cases of child recruitment by groups linked to the party, including children who were forced to remain with the groups or subjected to abuse when they attempted to leave.

As for the issue of the party abandoning the Kurdish cause, it is more complicated. The party moved from the slogan of unifying and liberating Kurdistan to abandoning the dream of a Kurdish state. This shift represents a genuine break with nationalism, because the objective is no longer to establish a Kurdish state, but rather to build what the writer describes as a failed and authoritarian democratic political society based on killing, looting and theft, depopulating Kurdish cities, sending their young people into futile conflicts, and plundering the country’s resources and sending them to Qandil. What do they do with all that money?

More dangerously, they are hostile to all Kurds. In their view, all Kurds are traitors and agents. Yet they are the ones who have betrayed the blood of their own comrades and their families the most. Today, I find people who played a role in identifying the locations of military centers and prominent figures who were targeted now serving as our leaders and decision-makers. And we, who sacrificed everything, are now writing about you and your filth...

See you in the next episode.


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