The İzmir Provincial Organisation of the Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party (DEM Party) held its 3rd Ordinary Congress with the slogan ‘We are organising against war, exploitation, oppression and poverty, we are marching towards freedom’.

DEM Party Spokesperson Ayşegül Doğan, Group Deputy Chair Sezai Temelli, politician Gültan Kışanak, MPs, Free Women’s Movement (Tevgera Jinên Azad, TJA) activists, Peace Mothers, political prisoners released after 30 years, representatives of civil society organisations attended the congress.

Speaking here, DEM Party Spokesperson Ayşegül Doğan stated the following:

“Peace will come to this land. It is time now. What is going on in Ankara? Nothing at all. Whatever is to happen will happen with us. I wish I could announce here today that ‘a new process has begun for a democratic solution to the Kurdish question’. But there is no development that we can call a new process yet. Amidst all these developments, our Urfa MP went to visit Mr Öcalan and brought his greetings. He conveyed a message against the speculations. The best development was this meeting and the message that came from it.

Do you want to send the message that a Kurd cannot govern Esenyurt?’ Is the state as a whole ready to solve the Kurdish question in a democratic way? If the state is ready, we need to put this promise into practice. We said, ‘there are conflicting sides to this issue’. If there is to be peace, the parties need to establish dialogue. Everyone can make new beginnings by learning lessons from the past. If you have a politicisation programme, the address is Mr Abdullah Öcalan in İmralı Island Prison. This truth has resisted the years. The reality of Öcalan is such a reality. They attacked us so much because we showed this truth.”

Speaking after, DEM Party Group Deputy Chairman Sezai Temelli stated that Öcalan has been generating the politics of peace for 25 years and said, “Can you tell us about a good development for 25 years? What positive development is there in the Middle East? Every day we wake up with a new crisis. The economy has collapsed, we talk about misery and hunger. The resources of this country go to war, not to the people. This is the economy created by those who feed on war. They continue to spend resources on UAVs and UCAVs. For 25 years, injustices have been produced every day. We will continue to defend the democratic nation against the nation state. We will defend Rojava and Bashur (South Kurdistan). We will call Rojavas the whole Middle East territories against those who see the Middle East as an arms market. The way to make the whole Middle East Rojavan is for the peoples to claim their own destiny. We have an idea, and we will continue to greet the owner of that idea at every opportunity. Öcalan will come out, speak and the world will change. We will win, we will definitely win.”

After the speeches, Selçuk Odabaşı and Fulya Erdoğan were elected as co-chairs of the DEM Party İzmir provincial organization.