KCK (Kurdistan Communities Union) Executive Council Co-Presidency issued a written statement on the 40th anniversary of PKK’s founding. KCK stressed that it has been 40 years since the founding congress of the PKK held on November 27, 1978 and added that the 40th anniversary is being celebrated with enthusiasm everywhere the Kurdish people, Kurdistanis and their allies live. KCK said, “We celebrate the founding day of the party for Leader Apo, all our comrades and our people, and we remember with respect and gratitude our martyrs who carried the party to this day.”

APOISTS SPARKED THE FIRE AGAINST GENOCIDAL COLONIALISM

“The foundations of our party were laid in the Ankara Cubuk Dam in 1973 by Leader Apo and his friends,” said the KCK statement and continued: “The emergence of the Apoists group has been a resurgence for our people. By early 1970s, we were on our last breath on our death bed as a people and a nation. Genocidal colonialism thought the Kurds would never rise again, and declared the victory of Turkish nation building over Kurds. The Apoists group emerged and sparked the fire against genocidal colonialism that wanted to turn Kurdistan into an area Turkish nation building would expand to. The Kurdish people were thus saved from the edge of the cliff, and with the epic struggle from that day on, have reached the reality of a people insisting on the fight for their freedom.

KURDISH PEOPLE’S VEINS GIVEN FRESH WATER OF LIFE

In the 45 years of struggle, great prices have been paid to give fresh water of life to the dried out veins of the Kurdish people. Tens of thousands of martyrs, tens of thousands of veterans, hundreds of thousands of prisoners, hundreds of thousands of tortured cadres and sympathisers have waged this epic struggle. They have waged the greatest guerrilla war in history. Our people have a reality of being up in arms and in uprisings for decades. We have a long history of struggle that spans generations. A tradition of struggle that has laid its roots deep within Kurdistan, deep in the cells of our people, an accumulation and a strength has been uncovered. The people of Kurdistan have an accumulation and a potential that will take a fighting people to victory like no other people had. The Kurdish people, in their insistence in their struggle, have already won the free and democratic life. The struggle afterwards will be to write the history of this victory. All our people have a responsibility to write this history, based on the strength we have uncovered in our 45 year history.

KURDISH PEOPLE BECAME THE LEADER OF REVOLUTION AND FREEDOM IN THE MIDDLE EAST

Following Leader Apo’s line, the PKK has become a leader for the free and democratic life of not just the Kurdish people but all the peoples of the Middle East. The Kurdish people are stating this reality by leading the democratic revolution wherever they are. The people of Kurdistan say PKK is the people, and the people are here. The peoples of the Middle East have launched the age of democratic revolutions in the Middle East in Leader Apo’s line, in an alliance with the Kurdish people. The Kurdish people have become the leader of revolutions and the struggle for freedom in the Middle East in the line of Leader Apo’s democratic socialism line based on democratic nation and an organized democratic society with democratic confederalism.

THE US DECISION IS A CONTINUATION OF THE CONSPIRACY

This level the Kurdish people have reached in the Middle East has brought on the increase of Middle Eastern regressive politics increasing animosity against Kurds through the PKK. The AKP-MHP fascist government in Turkey and all forces in the Middle East against democracy and freedom have increased their attacks against the Kurdish people. All counter-revolutionary forces attack the PKK and the struggle for freedom it leads in an alliance to smother the democratic revolution. They want to continue the Middle Eastern status quo of the 20th century based on a Kurdish genocide into the 21st century. The hostile decision by the US against the 3 revolutionary leaders of the PKK means the protection of the despotic governments of the Kurdish genocide in the Middle East of the 20th century. This decision is a continuation of the international conspiracy that resulted in the imprisonment of Leader Apo.

This decision is an admission that the conspiracy that resulted in the imprisonment of our Leader in 1999 hasn’t achieved the goal they wished it did. PKK has continued to get stronger despite the international conspiracy, and has become a force with influence over political balances in the Middle East today. All attacks have been geared towards breaking this strength of the PKK and to neutralize it. But it is no easy task to disband the line of Leader Apo and the PKK, which have influenced all Middle Eastern peoples. Our struggle for freedom that has laid deep roots in 45 years will certainly achieve victory with our people insisting on a free and democratic life.

LET’S RAISE THE STRUGGLE

On this basis, we are calling on all our people, all allies and all democratic forces in the Middle East to fight to void the conspiracy, free Leader Apo, and create a free Kurdistan and democratic Middle East. We are calling on the youth, women and our people to rise up wherever they are to raise the struggle to break the isolation imposed upon Leader Apo, to defeat fascism and to free Kurdistan.”