Parliament Speaker Numan Kurtulmuş met with opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu on Tuesday and is set to hold more talks with other party leaders as part of the Terror-Free Türkiye initiative. Kurtulmuş was scheduled to hold talks with top officials of the New Path Party (YY) later on Tuesday and visit the parliamentary offices of the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) and the ruling Justice and Development Party (AK Party) on Wednesday.
His talks focus on a “monitoring commission” expected to be established in Parliament for the purpose of monitoring the disarmament process of the terrorist group PKK. Kurtulmuş will seek the parties’ contribution to the commission, which is expected to follow the National Solidarity Commission. Established last year, the previous commission concluded its work after months of discussions with people, ranging from families of terror victims to academics, for input on shaping the initiative that aims to eliminate the PKK threat.
In remarks published on Monday, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan vowed not to abandon the Terror-Free Türkiye initiative, adding that the government was ready to pay whatever price necessary for the initiative to succeed. “Our top priority is for all elements of the group to complete the dissolution process, fully surrender their weapons and for this situation to be concretely established and verified by the relevant state institutions. Every step and every move is being closely monitored by the relevant state institutions and our government. This will continue in the same manner. I also believe that the Monitoring Commission will hopefully be established soon,” Erdoğan said.
The government has set up a separate board under a bill approved by Parliament to “follow up and evaluate” the initiative, and at its latest meeting in September, the board decided to establish four subcommittees: the Subcommittee on Judicial and Legal Affairs Coordination, the Subcommittee on Monitoring and Verification, the Subcommittee on Social Cohesion and Integration and the Subcommittee on Disarmament and Strategic Coordination.
