The continuing crackdown on Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) is undermining public support for a renewed effort to resolve the country’s decades-long Kurdish conflict, pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) Co-chair Tülay Hatimoğulları has warned.
In an interview with the Nefes daily published on Monday, Hatimoğulları described investigations targeting CHP-run municipalities as one of the biggest obstacles to making peace a nationwide political priority.
CHP municipalities have faced a succession of investigations since October 2024, most involving allegations of bribery, bid-rigging, abuse of office or organized crime.
Turkish media tallies indicate that at least 39 CHP municipalities have been targeted since the March 2024 local elections, with 26 incumbent mayors, including İstanbul Mayor and CHP presidential candidate Ekrem İmamoğlu, behind bars.
The CHP and rights groups describe the investigations as a politically motivated campaign to reverse the party’s gains in the local elections and eliminate potential rivals to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan.
The government denies interfering in the cases and maintains that Turkey’s courts operate independently.
“One of the most important obstacles to building social support for peace in Turkey today is the operations being conducted against the CHP,” Hatimoğulları told Nefes.
“These practices should never have taken place, but their occurrence at a time when peace is being discussed is particularly striking.”
The renewed peace initiative seeks to end the four-decade conflict between Turkey and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) through the group’s dissolution and laying down of arms as well as the creation of a political and legal framework to address the Kurdish issue, including longstanding demands for greater cultural, linguistic and political rights.
Hatimoğulları said the initiative needs the CHP’s full support to gain legitimacy across the country but that the government’s actions against the party are having the opposite effect.
“While the government should be taking this into account, the process has effectively begun to be sabotaged through the operations targeting the CHP,” she said.
Hatimoğulları also pointed to judicial intervention in the CHP’s leadership and internal affairs.
In May an Ankara appeals court annulled the CHP’s November 2023 congress, removing Özgür Özel and his administration from office as an interim measure and reinstating former chairman Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu and his team.
Özel had defeated Kılıçdaroğlu at the congress to become party leader. The ruling deepened divisions within the CHP and drew criticism for judicial interference in the internal affairs of Turkey’s main opposition party.
“As long as these operations continue, we will have difficulty building social support for peace and creating the perception that peace is Turkey’s top priority,” Hatimoğulları said.
No draft shared with DEM Party
Hatimoğulları also said uncertainty remains over the content and timing of legislation expected to provide a legal framework for the peace initiative.
She disputed claims by officials from Erdoğan’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) that an agreement had been reached on the legislation.
“I can say this very clearly: No text has been delivered to us,” Hatimoğulları said. “We do not know what is in the law the AKP intends to enact.”
Erdoğan announced in June that his government was preparing legislation to regulate and accelerate the PKK’s laying down of arms.
Reports have suggested that it will contain roughly 10 articles, take effect after state institutions verify the laying down of weapons and govern the possible return or reintegration of some PKK members.
Although the legislation has repeatedly been described as imminent, no draft has been made public. Hatimoğulları urged the government to share it before parliament begins its summer recess.
“If they have a draft, they must share it this week,” she said. “Parliament should not go into recess before this law is enacted.”
The DEM Party describes the proposed legislation as a “root law,” an initial measure that would establish the political and legal basis for subsequent reforms.
Hatimoğulları said jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan had prepared a seven or eight-point proposal based on the concept and discussed it with state representatives during a recent meeting on İmralı Island, where he has been imprisoned since 1999.
Although the text had not been delivered to the DEM Party, party officials had received a general briefing on its content, she said.
The current initiative began in October 2024 when far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli, Erdoğan’s main political ally, publicly urged Öcalan to call on the PKK to lay down its arms and disband.
Öcalan issued the appeal on February 27, 2025. The PKK subsequently declared a ceasefire and announced in May that it had decided to dissolve and end its armed campaign against Turkey.
Thirty militants burned their weapons during a symbolic ceremony in northern Iraq on July 11, 2025, and the group later announced the withdrawal of its remaining fighters from Turkey.
A parliamentary commission established to support the initiative endorsed a report in February recommending the reintegration of PKK members who renounce violence, a narrower legal definition of terrorism, expanded freedom of expression and an end to the appointment of government trustees to replace elected mayors.
The government, however, has yet to introduce legislation implementing those recommendations.
Kurdish politicians accuse Ankara of failing to respond to the PKK’s unilateral steps, while Erdoğan insists the process is continuing as planned.
The PKK, designated as a terrorist organization by Turkey and its Western allies, waged a four-decade armed campaign that left tens of thousands of people dead.
This article is republished from Turkish Minute.
