Whether imprisoned Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan will share the fate of former South African president Nelson Mandela, who was also denounced as a terrorist and spent three decades in prison on charges of treason before being released, is a big unknown.
What is clear is that the Justice and Development Party government is satisfied with Ocalan’s contribution to the talks that started in October 2012 aiming at ending the armed Kurdish movement that began in 1984. As a reflection of the AKP satisfaction, a fourth visit by a three-member delegation of the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) to Imrali prison was granted on Wednesday, April 3, which was not announced in advance, and came as a surprise a day before Ocalan marked his 64th birthday.