Prison Writings - The PKK and the Kurdish Question in the 21st Century

Abdullah Ocalan was the leader of the Kurdistan Workers Party, the PKK, and the most wanted man in Turkey for almost two decades. He was eventually kidnapped while in Kenya in 1999, and has been in prison in Turkey ever since.

From 1984, under his leadership, the PKK fought for an independent Kurdish state in the south east of Turkey. In a sustained popular uprising, tens of thousands of PKK guerrillas took on the second largest army in NATO. The conflict has remained unsolved till today and the fighting still goes on.

While in prison, Mr. Ocalan has written a number of books, in which he analyses the situation in Kurdistan and offers proposals for a peaceful solution to the conflict. In the second volume of his Prison Writings Ocalan applies the political and historical philosophy that was developed in the first volume of his Prison Writings to the Kurdish question. It is less philosophical and abstract and addresses the concrete political issues at the centre of the Kurdish question. He calls for a “Renaissance of the Middle East” where the integration of democratic western values and universal human rights with the deeply rooted cultural values of the Middle Eastern societies, especially the Kurdish one, will form a new synthesis.

Complete and unabridged electronic version of the printed edition including prefaces and all notes by the editors (200 pages).