ANKARA
Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc on Saturday stressed the need for a monitoring group in Turkey's solution process aimed at solving the decades-old conflict with the PKK terrorist organization.
"There is a need for monitoring committee; it will give positive results in the process and the government has the resolve to implement it," Arinc told reporters in the capital, Ankara.
Asked by one reporter about the letter issued by PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan who declared the end of armed struggle and called on the terrorist group to hold a congress to discuss laying down arms, Arinc called Ocalan's message "positive and hopeful" for the process.
“PKK must convene a congress to end the 40-year armed conflict against Turkey,” Ocalan was quoted by saying in his message read out during Newroz -- beginning of spring -- celebration in southeastern Diyarbakir.
It was read by pro-Kurdish party Peoples' Democratic Party, or HDP, deputy chairperson Pervin Buldan in the Kurdish language and by HDP Istanbul lawmaker Sirri Sureyya Onder in Turkish.
“We face the duty of initiating a new process based on the ten-point historical declaration made public in the Dolmabahce Palace,” Ocalan said in the message.
Arinc also touched on remarks of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan over his disapproval of the government-approved monitoring group.
"Forming a monitoring group is part of steps taken during the process so far and the government sees it as useful. We have a roadmap as to how to finalize the solution process and the government is responsible for it," Arinc said.
He also recalled that Erdogan was the person that started and continued the solution process, which began in early 2012 in an effort to end conflict with the PKK, which is listed by Turkey, U.S. and the European Union as a terrorist organization.
However, Arinc said that Erdogan's remarks expressing his dislike for the monitoring group project were "emotional" and “personal ideas” which he said might attract criticism.
Arinc said the peace process was being carried out by the government, and it was the government which had the responsibility to bring it to bear fruit.
Arinc's remarks came a day after Erdogan said in Istanbul that he was not in favor of a monitoring group for the Kurdish solution process.
