“What they once expressed in words has today evolved into a programme, a war, and ultimately a peace,” said Abdullah Öcalan, recalling in a 1986 speech the revolutionary legacy of Deniz Gezmiş and others executed on 6 May 1972. “This is exciting.”
Commemorations across Turkey on Tuesday marked 53 years since the execution of Deniz Gezmiş, Yusuf Aslan and Hüseyin İnan—three leftist activists who became enduring symbols of political resistance in the country. While many remembered their struggle, Saruhan Oluç, a leading figure of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy (DEM) Party, spoke to Medya Haber TV on Tuesday, linking their legacy to today’s Kurdish political movement and the party’s renewed “Call for Peace and a Democratic Society” issued on 27 February.
The executions took place at Ankara Central Prison following a military court verdict during the 1971 coup period. The three men, members of the People’s Liberation Army of Turkey (THKO), had become icons of the revolutionary youth of the late 1960s and early ’70s. Their death, many argue, marked a turning point in Turkey’s radical left.
In his 1986 speech, delivered during his formative years in the Kurdish struggle, Öcalan emphasised the ideological continuity between the Turkish leftist revolutionaries and the Kurdish liberation movement. “Deniz Gezmiş shouting on the gallows, ‘I cry out for the brotherhood and freedom of the Turkish and Kurdish peoples.’ … It’s as if these were never said,” he remarked. “I’ve seen the failure to honour these great revolutionaries properly as a deep shortcoming. … If I don’t, I feel as though I am in conflict with my very essence.”
Öcalan’s statement highlighted the historical convergence of socialist movements in Turkey around the unresolved “Kurdish question”—a political and cultural issue central to Turkey’s modern history. He cited Mahir Çayan’s insistence that “the most fundamental issue is the Kurdish question” and İbrahim Kaypakkaya’s foundational work on national identity as pivotal moments that informed his political direction. “Therefore, what they once expressed in words has today evolved into a programme, a war, and ultimately a peace,” he concluded.
Half a century later, this sentiment was echoed by Saruhan Oluç during his speech on Tuesday. Oluç affirmed that “the 27 February Call for Peace and a Democratic Society” is rooted in the ideals of the 1970s left. “You might ask why. Because we are faced with a call that addresses the issue of the equality and brotherhood of peoples, the alliance and relationship between the Turkish and Kurdish peoples,” he said.
The 27 February call has become a key political declaration by the DEM Party, aimed at creating a pluralist, democratic framework for Turkey’s future, one that includes recognition of ethnic, religious and linguistic diversity. “We know that the 27 February call carries within it the spirit of that era—the spirit of struggle, of solidarity, of the fight for freedom and equality,” Oluç said.
He also honoured the recent death of former MP and filmmaker Sırrı Süreyya Önder, describing him as a bridge between communities. “So many different segments came together to say farewell to Sırrı Süreyya Önder. … Different peoples, beliefs, communities—that was very meaningful.”
During Önder’s illness and funeral, Oluç said, a rare moment of “social peace” was achieved in Turkey. “Now it is up to us to realise the great peace,” he said, quoting DEM Party’s Pervin Buldan. “That means ensuring democratic transformation in every sense—in the country, in society, in our organisational relationships.”
According to Oluç, the DEM Party remains committed to this aim despite political challenges and state pressure. “As we promised Sırrı Süreyya Önder, we will achieve the great peace, and we will keep that promise,” he vowed.
The legacy of Deniz Gezmiş and his comrades, as invoked by both Öcalan and Oluç, continues to serve as a shared reference point for leftist and Kurdish movements in Turkey. Despite ideological and strategic differences across decades, both movements have grappled with the need to resolve Turkey’s ethnic inequalities and authoritarian structures.
For a younger generation unfamiliar with these names, Oluç offered a bridge. “Looking at it both as the DEM Party and more broadly as the Kurdish political and freedom movement, there is a continuing struggle,” he said, linking past and present.
