Gorka Elejabarrieta Diaz, a Basque politician and Senator in Spain’s Madrid parliament, has made a statement in support of imprisoned Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan’s recent historic call for the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) to disarm, as part of a process of peace and democratisation in Turkey.
Meanwhile in Switzerland, politician Fabian Molina has tabled questions in parliament, asking for the Swiss government to react to Öcalan’s proposal.
Diaz is part of the leftist Euskal Herria Bildu (Basque Country Unite) party, a leftwing, pro-independence Basque nationalist electoral coalition established in 2012. Molina is a representative of the Social Democratic Party of Switzerland (SP), which is currently the second largest of Switzerland’s four party coalition.
Öcalan’s historic call
Diaz and Molina are responding to the historic call for peace and democracy made by Öcalan on 27 February. The message from the imprisoned leader, read out by Peoples’ Equality and Democracy (DEM) Party MPs Ahmet Türk and Pervin Buldan, called for the dissolution of the PKK, and for the Kurdish people to take part in a new era of negotiations with the Turkish state, with the aim of reconciling the conflict between them. They are the latest politicians to voice support for Öcalan’s initiative.
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A shared history
Diaz made the following statement on social media platform X:
“Following Öcalan’s call, we have registered a motion in the Senate urging all parties to take advantage of this new scenario for peace and calling on the Spanish Government to take an active part in favour of dialogue and a political resolution of the conflict. #BijîKurdistan”
Last October, Diaz was part of a parliamentary coalition that submitted a motion calling for the release of Öcalan, arguing that his freedom is essential to ending the cycle of violence in Turkey and Kurdistan. Diaz is also a member of the International Initiative for Justice for the Kurds, and has been a part of the campaign to remove the PKK from the terror list.
The Basque people have themselves lived through a struggle between the Spanish State and Euskadi Ta Askatasuna or ETA, which ended with a peace process, disarmament and the ETA’s dissolution in 2018.
‘Paving the way’ for a peace process
Molina submitted the following resolution to the Swiss parliament on 5 March:
“PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan paves the way for a peace process with Turkey in his statement on 27 February 2025, which was also welcomed by Turkish President Recep Erdoğan.”
Bearing in mind this resolution, Molina asked the parliament the following questions:
“- Does the Federal Council support a peace process in Turkey? If so, by what means? What principles are guiding it?
– Has it offered Switzerland’s good offices?
– How is Switzerland campaigning for humane prison conditions for Abdullah Öcalan during the peace process?”
The answers to Molina’s questions are not currently available.
Molina has previously spoken at a rally for Öcalan’s freedom in Switzerland. He also introduced a motion in 2023, calling on Switzerland to recognise the genocide of the Yazidi people. The Swiss National Council eventually recognised the genocide in December 2024.
