Turkey's pro-Kurdish discusses PKK disarmament process with Erdogan

By Ece Toksabay

ANKARA (Reuters) -Turkey's pro-Kurdish DEM party said a delegation had met President Tayyip Erdogan on Monday to discuss the disarmament process of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants and had conveyed its recommendations on the next potential steps.

The meeting, which lasted around one hour at the presidency in Ankara, came amid Turkish media reports that the PKK - locked in a bloody conflict with Turkey for more than four decades - would start handing over its weapons in Iraq this week.

In a statement after the meeting, DEM said "the mutual will to move the process along" was also emphasised during the meeting with Erdogan, without elaborating further. There was no immediate comment from the Turkish presidency.

Earlier, DEM - the third biggest party in Turkey's parliament and which played a key role facilitating the PKK's disarmament decision - said it had met jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan in prison on Sunday.

Ocalan "attached great importance" to the DEM meeting with Erdogan, describing it as "historic", the party said.

The PKK decided in May to disband and end its armed struggle. The PKK could start handing over its weapons in the coming days, officials and sources have said previously.

Since Ocalan's public call in February to his PKK militants - based in the mountains of northern Iraq - DEM has held talks with Erdogan and other government officials seeking to push the potential peace process.

HANDING OVER WEAPONS

Turkish broadcaster NTV said Ibrahim Kalin, head of Turkey's MIT intelligence agency, would visit Baghdad on Tuesday for talks with Iraq's president and government on the process of the PKK handing over its weapons.

NTV said Kalin would also meet Turkish Parliamentary Speaker Numan Kurtulmus this week to coordinate the parliamentary side of the disarmament process.

Citing security sources, NTV said the PKK would start handing over its weapons in groups in Iraq later this week. The process will be carried out in a predetermined timeline and the weapons will be recorded by authorities, it said.

Since the PKK launched its insurgency against Turkey in 1984 - originally with the aim of creating an independent Kurdish state - the conflict has killed more than 40,000 people, imposed a huge economic burden and fuelled social tensions.

Ankara has said skirmishes between Turkish soldiers and PKK militants in southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq have continued since Ocalan's call, adding that Turkey was still raiding PKK storage areas and bases in the region.

(Additional reporting by Ezgi Erkoyun and Zeynep Berkem; Writing by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by Michael Perry and Gareth Jones)