Kurdistan Workers Party

(Kurdish Separatists, Mesopotamian Army)

The Kurdistan Workers Party (KWP) is a left-wing, Marxist-oriented terrorist
organization (Kurdish Separatists, Mesopotamian Army), established in 1978. Initially, it was
focused on political affairs. The founder and head of the KWP, Abdullah Ocalan, led the
organization up until 1999.
The KWP is a Kurdish military and political organization, whose goal is to create a
national autonomy for the Kurds within the territory of the Turkish state. By and large, it aims to
fight for political rights for all the Kurds living in Turkey. In order to achieve the stated goals,
the KWP oftentimes carries out terrorist attacks and kidnappings of civilians, for which reason it
is labeled as a terrorist organization. The KWP disposes an armed wing, the National Defense
Forces.
Initially, the political program envisaged the establishment of a sovereign Kurdish entity,
based on the parliamentary system; on the economic field, the private propriety was supposed to
be nationalized. In the 1990s, as the international climate changed, Ocalan attempted to change
the leading ideology. In the recent years, the idea of creating a federation, uniting the Kurds and
the Turks, or a Kurdish autonomy, is becoming more and more popular. Furthermore, Ocalan
mentions about the necessity of assessing the social-economic achievements of capitalism and
socialism, underlines the significance of observing human rights and the priority of individual
interests over state interests.
In 1984, the KWP declared war on the Turkish government. The first military action was
registered on August 15, 1984, leading to the capture of the town of Eruh by the Kurdish
guerillas. From that point, the organization waged an uninterrupted military struggle. The KWP
rely on the advantages of guerilla tactics, thus conducting operations against the Turkish military
and police on Kurdish populated territories within Turkey, and striving to take control over
Kurdish settlements. At the same time, the KWP detachments also resort to urban terrorism, such
as assaulting Turkish activists, businessmen and diplomats (even outside Turkey, specifically in
Europe); sabotage; attacks on foreign tourists, which is a tactic highly common in third world
countries.
The KWP military detachments number about 4000 members in total. Over a period of 15
years, more than 37 000 people have died in the aftermath of the war. In 1993, around 4000
armed attacks have been undertaken. In 1995, the Turkish military and police forces carried out
two large scale operations, aiming to liquidate the fighters camps, which resulted in the death of
up to 1000 fighters, and respectively 2500 as a grand total per year. This had diminished the
guerilla activity in the region, with 411 operations carried out in 1995.
The Kurds resort to terrorist tactics as to attract worlds attention over the unfavorable
conditions the Kurds have to face in Turkey. As a rule, in the aftermath of terrorist attacks in
Europe, the casualties are only minimal. On July 24, 1993, the Kurds have conducted a series of
attacks in Europe against Turkish diplomats and representatives of commercial organizations.
Assaults on tourists are mostly aimed towards demonstrating the power of the KWP. In the
process of these operations though, killing as many people as possible is not essential. For
example, on March 27, 1994, a bomb planted in St. Sophia Mosque was detonated, resulting in 3
tourists being injured: a German, a Spaniard and a Dutch. The Kurdish Freedom Falcons
(operates in Istanbul) have taken responsibility for the attack.
The KWP coordinates the struggle with the Armenian underground movement in Turkey.
One third of the KWP fighters are Armenian, and, besides that, the underground provides the
Kurds valuable intelligence. The movement is partly funded through donations and revolution
taxes, which are collected from the Kurdish population or private figures. There is also a
possibility for incomes to come from drugs trade. The success of KWP is in many ways
facilitated by the tight cooperation with the Syrian government. The Kurds have a wide network
of training camps on the territories of Syria and Lebanon. The headquarters and the whole
leadership, including Ocalan, was located in Damascus.
On August, 1999, the KWP forwarded a proposal for a temporary ceasefire to the
government of Turkey, which lasted for almost 5 years, and represented the most peaceful period
in the entire conflict. Overall, throughout the entire struggle, 5 different temporary ceasefires
have been agreed on, with a varying degree of success.
Guerilla activity had again started to rise between the timeframe of 2005-2006, now
launching operations from bases located in Iraq. In that period, the Kurds practically enjoyed a
de-facto full independence.
Such evolutions werent in accordance to the interests of Ankara, which periodically
launched airstrikes over northern Iraq. In practice, this can be considered as an act of aggression
against a sovereign country. In 2007, while conducting airstrikes against the KWP bases in Iraq,
the Turkish army carried out a large scale invasion in the neighboring country.
In 2013, the Turkish government and Abdullah Ocalan were working on a new plan to put
an end to the prolonged conflict. According to the new plan, the KWP fighters would have to
leave the Turkish territory, while Turkey itself agreed to constitutional change for equal rights of
all the ethnical entities. Besides, it was agreed to free all the captive KWP activists and fighters.
 On December 21, 2015, the Turkish military launched a large scale operation against
KWP in the settlements of Jizra and Silopa. It only ended in February, 2016.
The Kurdish problem remains one of the most stringent issues in the entire Middle East.
In 2002, the KWP was included in the EU list of terrorist organizations, but in April,
2008, a European lawsuit canceled the decision.