Slovenian philosopher Alenka Zupančič has voiced her full support for Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan’s latest appeal for peace and a democratic society, describing it as a rare source of hope in times of deep political impasse.
In a message dated 25 May, Zupančič urged “all progressive intellectuals” to stand behind Öcalan’s call, which was issued from prison on 27 February and centred on reviving peace efforts in Turkey and the wider region.
“I fully support Kurdish leader Abdullah Öcalan’s call for peace and a democratic society, and invite all progressive intellectuals to endorse it,” she said. “The peace process in Turkey is one of those unexpected surprises that gives us the courage to persist in our struggle, even during the darkest times when the iron logic of global deadlocks seems unbreakable.”
Zupančič, one of the founding figures of the Ljubljana School of psychoanalysis, is internationally recognised for her work on Nietzsche and Lacanian theory. Her intervention signals renewed intellectual interest in the stalled Kurdish peace process in Turkey.
Fellow Slovenian philosopher Slavoj Žižek also voiced strong support for Öcalan, publishing an article on 24 May titled ‘Abdullah Öcalan is the Mandela of our time’. Žižek called the self-dissolution of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) “an authentic, courageous act,” and urged international solidarity with the Kurdish movement as a “glimmer of hope” amid rising barbarism in the sovereign states around them.
Öcalan, who has been imprisoned on İmralı Island since 1999, issued his appeal as part of a broader discourse on conflict resolution and democratic autonomy. He remains the symbolic figurehead of the Kurdish movement in Turkey, and the conditions of isolation imposed on him in his Turkish prison continue to draw widespread criticism from international human rights groups.
