Fabien Roussel, the communist candidate for the presidential elections to be held in France in April, has shared a message on his Twitter account on the 23rd anniversary of the international conspiracy against Abdullah Öcalan that resulted in his abduction from Kenya to Turkey on 15 February 1999. The Kurdish leader has been held in aggravated isolation in the Imrali Island Prison since.

Fabien Roussel wrote the following on Twitter on Tuesday:

“The Kurdish leader, A. Ocalan, has been imprisoned for 24 years in defiance of international conventions.  His release will open a path to peace in order to promote the progressive, feminist and ecological project of the Kurds.

#freeocalan”

Roussel and his party PCF have been on good terms with the Kurdish people for many years now. Roussel participated in the commemoration event this year for the three Kurdish women revolutionaries who were murdered in Paris on January 9, 2013 and expressed his solidarity.

At a party rally held in Marseille in early February and attended by around 4,000 people, Roussel commemorated the journalists who were murdered in the Charlie Hebdo massacre, the teacher Samuel Paty, who was beheaded and the Kurds who fought against ISIS. The communist candidate noted that he was proud of “the Kurds who are currently fighting the irredentist Islamists and are subjected to the bombings of Erdogan and Turkey.” His remarks were applauded by the participants in the rally.