DUBAI, February 28. /TASS/. Iran supports the fight against terrorism and welcomes the call from the militant leader of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), Abdullah Ocalan, to lay down arms, Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Esmail Baghaei said in a statement on Friday.
“As we welcome the PKK leader’s call to lay down weapons, Baghaei called the decision an important step toward ending the violence and stated that the Islamic Republic of Iran supports any process that will lead to the elimination of terrorism and the strengthening of security in neighboring Turkey,” reads the statement released on the Iranian ministry’s Telegram channel. Tehran hopes that Ocalan’s decision will have a favorable impact on security in the Middle East.
On February 27, Ocalan urged all PKK-related groups to disarm and stop their military confrontation with Turkey as he called on the PKK to disband itself.
The conflict between Turkey and the PKK has been going on since 1984. Turkey considers the PKK a threat to its national security and regularly conducts raids against its supporters in the country and operations in northern Syria and Iraq.