In a written statement, the KCK (Kurdistan Communities Union) Executive Council Co-Presidency welcomed the 2023 Newroz and said: "Our peoples, especially the people of Kurdistan, should take to the squares in millions during Newroz and hold the AKP-MHP, the murderer of the thousands of people lost in the earthquake, to account."

The statement by the KCK Executive Council Co-Presidency reads as follows: 

"We have entered a new Newroz period, a symbol of resistance and revival. First of all, we would like to wish everybody `Newroz pîroz be!` and celebrate the Newroz of all our peoples with the spirit of resistance and struggle. We celebrate the 2023 Newroz of Leader Apo [Abdullah Öcalan], who has paved the way for us to struggle and regain our existence by resisting and has given us the consciousness and will to do so. We celebrate the Newroz holiday of the people of Kurdistan, who have continued the tradition of Newroz by continuously resisting oppression until the present day and have thus become one with Newroz. Newroz is the holiday of all oppressed social groups, women, youth, laborers as well as peoples, and expresses their feelings of freedom. In this respect, we celebrate the Newroz of women, youth, laborers and all resisting social groups.

Newroz is an attitude of resistance created by the oppressed against the oppressors by paying a price for freedom. This historical characteristic of Newroz has also been valid in the age we are in. By paying a great price to regain existence and achieve freedom, Newroz has been reunited with its true meaning. Undoubtedly, it was the Kawa of our time who reintroduced the meaning of Newroz. We therefore commemorate with great respect, love and gratitude all the martyrs of revolution and democracy in the person of our great Newroz martyrs and Kawas of today - Mazlum Doğan, Zekiye, Rahşan, Ronahi and Bêrîvan. They became the Kawas of our time, revived the Newroz tradition and resurrected the people of Kurdistan with Newroz. We bow with respect in front of their struggle and reiterate our promise of success and victory to our martyrs. There is no doubt that victory is possible if the struggle grows along the lines of the martyrs. Our movement has walked on this path until today and has made great progress. From now on, our movement will continue to walk on the path of the martyrs without stopping until we achieve victory and live up to the memory of the martyrs. No one should have any doubt about this.

Newroz has expressed the truth of the history and tradition of the peoples' resistance reflected in mythology, epic and folk songs. It has survived until the present day by being celebrated as a holiday. We know very well that, just like today, there have been cruel Dehaks in history, and the peoples oppressed under the oppression of Dehaks have revolted under the leadership of blacksmith Kawas, destroyed the castles of oppression and made the peoples exist and free again.

Since Newroz puts an end to oppression and gives new spirit and meaning to life, it has been given the meaning of a new day. In this respect, the meaning of Newroz is hidden in its name. This is to recreate oneself on the basis of freedom, spring and feast. For thousands of years, when the cruel Dehaks emerged in Kurdistan and the Middle East and started to persecute the peoples, the blacksmith Kawas emerged against these oppressors and their oppression and started rebellions. The fires of rebellion spread in waves and the oppressors were defeated. Today, in the same ancient geography of Kurdistan and the Middle East, the great resistance and struggle led by the modern Kawas against the modern-day Dehak proves this historical fact.

The 2023 Newroz marks the 50th anniversary of the great march for freedom that Leader Apo started on Newroz. Because of this, Newroz 2023 has a special meaning for us. Fifty years ago, Leader Apo held a meeting with a group of friends at the Ankara-Çubuk dam and took the first organized step towards the Kurdistan revolution. The great freedom march that continues to this day is the continuation of this step that Leader Apo took fifty years ago during Newroz. Leader Apo has always emphasized the importance of this meeting on the day of Newroz and wanted us to understand it. From the very beginning, Leader Apo acted with the idea that the Kurdish people, whose country was torn apart and oppressed under the clutches of genocidal colonialism, could only resurrect with the spirit of Newroz and built the Kurdistan Freedom Revolution on the basis of resistance. Throughout history, the people of Kurdistan have been able to exist by living according to the Newroz tradition and resisting oppressors and oppression.

Leader Apo understood and acted accordingly against the policies of denial and annihilation of today's genocidal colonialist order, which far exceeds the oppression of the historical Dehak. He has understood that the Kurdish people can only be saved from extinction by Newroz, by taking the resistance tradition of Newroz as a basis. The Kurdistan Freedom Revolution was shaped according to these principles determined by Leader Apo. It is the result of this characteristic that the Kurdish Freedom Movement was not defeated, that it survived against all attacks, that it raised the Kurdish people, who were thought to be finished and exhausted, to their feet again and made them fight for their freedom and realized the revolution of resurrection. The people of Kurdistan have also reconstituted their essence according to the principles of freedom and resistance determined by Leader Apo. In this respect, they have essentially restored the Kurdish people to their historical essence and identity. Because the genocidal colonialist order alienated the Kurdish people from their historical and social identity and essence. By creating the PKK and bringing it together with the people, Leader Apo reunited the Kurdish people with its true essence and identity, that is, with Newroz. For this reason, Leader Apo has defined the Kurdish people as the people of Newroz.

There is no doubt that one of the greatest bastions of oppression in human history was the Diyarbakır Prison. In order to extinguish the sparks of freedom ignited by Leader Apo and to plunge the people of Kurdistan into darkness forever, today's cruel geniuses built Diyarbakır Prison, one of the greatest fortresses of oppression in human history. The revolutionaries of Kurdistan were strangled in this fortress of oppression and the people of Kurdistan were supposed to be completely suffocated there. Comrade Mazlum Doğan lit the Newroz fire by igniting three matchsticks, and by making himself Newroz, he tore the darkness that was supposed to cover the people of Kurdistan and became a real contemporary Kawa by illuminating the path of freedom. Zekiye, Rahşan, Ronahi and Bêrîvan, who walked on the path illuminated by our great Newroz martyr Mazlum Doğan, lit their bodies with the Newroz fire and illuminated the whole Kurdistan and the world. The people of Kurdistan have destroyed all the strongholds of oppression one by one and recreated themselves by walking on the bright path lit by the bodies of the Newroz martyrs.

The people of Kurdistan took to the squares in their thousands and turned Newroz into an uprising, becoming the people of Newroz again. Just as the fire lit by blacksmith Kawa spread throughout the mountains and plains of Kurdistan in history, the Newroz fire lit by the great Newroz martyr Mazlum Doğan and raised by the bodies of Zekiye, Rahşan, Bêrîvan and Ronahi spread to Cizre, Nusaybin and from there throughout Kurdistan and turned into a great popular revolt. Newroz became a revolt, resistance and uprising for the people of Kurdistan. In this sense, Newroz is the death of the oppressors and the birth of the oppressed.

Newroz was welcomed as a day of resistance, revival and freedom not only for the people of Kurdistan, but also for all the peoples of Mesopotamia, the Caucasus, the Middle East and the world, and was celebrated as a holiday by all peoples. In fact, Newroz is a tradition developed and created by the peoples resisting together against the cruel Dehak. Today, all peoples should join hands and take to the squares with feelings of brotherhood and solidarity, celebrate Newroz with their own colors, languages, identities and feelings, and reveal their solidarity against the oppressors by igniting the Newroz fire.

Today, the fascist AKP-MHP government aims to extinguish the fire of freedom ignited by the contemporary Kawa Mazlum Doğan and his successors, who have revived the people of Kurdistan, by carrying out the Kurdish genocide. In this respect, today's fortress of oppression is the genocidal colonialist Turkish State that wants to destroy the Kurdish people, and today's oppressors are the AKP-MHP, who established and govern this order of oppression. The fascist AKP-MHP government
shows its inhuman character to the whole world by keeping Leader Apo imprisoned in the absolute isolation and torture system in İmralı and by committing crimes against the Kurdistan Freedom Guerrilla, which it is afraid to fight against and cannot defeat, by using chemical weapons. Genocidal colonialist Turkish fascism wants to carry out the Kurdish genocide by invading South Kurdistan [North Iraq], destroying the Rojava Revolution, attacking Şengal and the Mexmur Camp, massacring Kurds wherever they are, bombing the geography of Kurdistan every day and destroying its nature. There is no doubt that Tayyip Erdoğan, who is at the head of this order of oppression, is the cruel Dehak of our time. Against this tyrannical order of AKP-MHP fascism and the cruel Dehak, the people of Kurdistan should take to the squares in millions and with the spirit of uprising in this Newroz, as they have done in the past, and express their protest strongly against the cruel Dehak of today, as they have done in history. Our peoples in the four parts of Kurdistan and abroad should celebrate Newroz by taking to the squares wherever they are and igniting the torch of resistance and freedom of the contemporary Kawa Mazlum Doğan against the cruel Dehaks of today. The people of Kurdistan should strongly demand the physical freedom of Leader Apo in the 2023 Newroz, the 50th Newroz of the Leadership [Abdullah Öcalan], and take a very strong stance against the occupation, genocide and massacres of AKP-MHP fascism. Newroz is the day when the resistance against oppression is revealed in the strongest way. The people of Kurdistan must show this level of resistance against the AKP-MHP oppression everywhere in the Newroz of 2023. As we have expressed on many occasions, the fascist AKP-MHP government has an anti-Kurdish mentality. We have brought this government to the brink of destruction with the struggle we have waged as a people and movement against this anti-Kurdish fascist and genocidal mentality. Now, it is time to completely destroy this fascist power.

In this Newroz, millions of people must destroy the fascist AKP-MHP government by igniting the torch of resistance against oppression and oppressors. After the earthquake, it has been revealed clearly that the AKP-MHP and the order established by it is an order of massacre, plunder and destruction. The reason why the earthquake resulted in massacres is the fascist AKP-MHP government. AKP-MHP fascism has stolen all the riches of Turkish society and given them to the gangs and barons who are waging this war. It has thus become clear that this government does nothing for the life and future of society.

Our peoples, especially the people of Kurdistan, must take to the squares in millions on Newroz to hold the AKP-MHP, the killers of thousands of people lost in the earthquake, to account. Although our people are mourning this year due to the earthquake, this must turn into anger during Newroz. Our people should take to the squares in millions, light the Newroz fire and show their protest, anger and attitude against the AKP-MHP, the modern day Dehaks. Our peoples should celebrate Newroz everywhere with their language, identity, culture, national colors and clothes. With the glorious Newroz, the darkness will be illuminated, the peoples will gain their freedom, the castles of oppression will fall and the oppressors will disappear. Based on this belief, we would like to once again congratulate the people of Kurdistan, the peoples of the Middle East and the world, women, young people and all those who resist on the 50th Newroz of the Leadership."