Turkey could soon strike a historic peace deal with the Kurds
But many pitfalls lie ahead
DEVLET BAHCELI, the leader of Turkey’s biggest nationalist party, has made a career out of opposing concessions to the country’s 15m-strong Kurdish minority. The only solution to Turkey’s conflict with armed Kurdish separatists, he has long argued, is to pound them into the ground. Since 2016, when Mr Bahceli and his Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) threw their weight behind Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, he has been able to put his convictions to work. On his watch, the government unleashed armed offensives against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) at home and abroad. Thousands of Kurdish politicians and activists ended up behind bars.
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This article appeared in the Europe section of the print edition under the headline “The long road to peace”
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