Lay down your arms, conduct politics in Parliament - Erdoğan tells PKK

Turkey's government will act as interlocutor during the ongoing peace process only if the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) lays down its arms, Hurriyet cites Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as saying on March 9.

“There is only one thing to be done: You will [lay down] your weapons. You will conduct your political acts at Parliament. If you have an idea or a thought to say, you will express it. If you do that, you will find an interlocutor,” Erdoğan said in the heavily-Kurdish province of Siirt in Turkey's southeast, where he was elected to Parliament for the first time following the repeal of his electoral ban in 2003.

Erdoğan asked again for locals to support the "resolution process" and reiterated his disregard for ethnic nationalism while insisting his government would not accept anything that challenged Turkey’s indivisibility. “Twelve years ago, we said no to ethnic nationalism. We said no to policies of denial and assimilation. We are also against regional nationalism. The East will have exactly the same as the West. Wither with a central government or a local government,” he said.