In Symbolic Move, PKK Lays Down Arms After Decades-Long Fight Against Turkey

In return for disarmament, the PKK and Turkey’s pro-Kurdish DEM Party expect Ankara to embark on a program of democratic reform.

PKK fighters walk through the damaged streets of Sinjar, Iraq, on Jan. 29, 2015. Bram Janssen/AP Photo

Thirty Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) fighters laid down—and destroyed—their weapons in a symbolic disarmament ceremony on July 11 in the city of Sulaymaniyah in northern Iraq’s Kurdish region.

“Today marks the beginning of a new era of Kurdish politics,” Ahmet Turk, a veteran Kurdish politician who attended the event, told the Erbil-based Rudaw news agency.