The Imralı transcripts and the rug!..

While the raw transcript of the meeting held by three members of parliament on November 24—which aimed to make the Gazi Assembly, which waged the struggle against imperialism, engage with the terrorist leader who is a puppet of imperialists—was over 60 pages long, someone reduced it to 16 pages. Then, it was summarized and released in 4 pages in a way that made neither the beginning nor the end, the front nor the back, understandable.

When those four pages were released and the DEM side claimed that the content of the meeting was different from this transcript, the first to react was Bahçeli, who said, "The messages of the PKK founding leadership are reasonable, positive, valid, and certain." Bahçeli accused the DEM members of "distorting the process and muddying clear waters."

When Saygı Öztürk from Sözcü wrote down point by point what the terrorist leader wanted, everyone in authority fell silent, and pro-government columnists spoke up. Some claimed that Öztürk was being "used," while others alleged that he "wanted to provoke Turkish nationalism."

However, neither the authorities nor the pro-government columnists could say a word about the following remarks by Cengiz Çandar, another DEM member with whom Bahçeli posed in Parliament:

"Parliament Speaker Numan Bey is making a decision on his own. That is how I know it. He says, 'Let's publish a summary transcript.' And to publish a summary transcript, he gives it to one of the parliamentary bureaucrats. That is, he says to bureaucrats who have no political personality, 'Extract a summary of this, I will publish the summary.' That person or persons, whoever they are, come up with such a text... The summary transcript that was distributed in the commission should be thrown into the trash can. It has no value... It does not reflect the truth, and in some subjects, especially regarding Rojava, Syria, and the SDF, there are sentences in the summary transcript that are capable of drawing conclusions exactly opposite to what Abdullah Öcalan said in response to the questions asked. These are not in the main transcript... Once the truth comes out, this is just a piece of paper. It has no value as a document."

He Equated Himself with Bahçeli

Just when the issue of the meeting and the transcripts had almost been forgotten, for some reason, two months later, the first 16-page summary was published, and it was seen that everything that had been called a "lie" was true. But interestingly, it was not debated as much as the first 4-page transcript.

It seems the terrorist leader's insolent demands have become so digested and seen as normal!..

Look at this self-confidence: "The Kurdish issue has moved from the state level to the political level, and he is now going to discuss this serious issue with politicians"... "The attacks made against him are attacks against peace and the law of brotherhood, and some of those who do this are influence agents"...

Look at this insolence: "He looks at the families of martyrs the way Atatürk looked at the Anzacs in the Gallipoli campaign"... "Whatever Bahçeli's weight is among nationalists, his own weight within the Kurdish movement is the same"... "If he is not included, a 100-year Turkish-Kurdish war will be inevitable."

The main reason for sending three members of parliament to the terrorist leader's feet was for him to call on the Syrian PKK to lay down their arms, right? Well, did he?

According to the transcripts; he supposedly approved the words of MHP's Feti Yıldız regarding "no statehood, federal structure, or autonomy," but while stating that Mazlum Kobani, the head of the Syrian PKK, was one of the people closest to him, he also said the following:

- "That the origin of the commune is Kurdish; that it means community, gathering, that it was municipalism in the Middle Ages, that it is the municipalization, corporatization, and local democracy of the people, that he proposes this for Turkey; that what he wants for Turkey, he also wants for Syria, that this is local democracy and commune (democratic municipalism), that he could establish a dialogue with the SDF in this context, that he thinks they would listen to him, but that they would not act unilaterally in this sense, and that Ahmed El-Shara should also take positive steps for a democratic Syria like the SDF..."

- "That for a state, regional local democracy is as necessary as central unitary powers, that one cannot exist without the other, that forces would be present within the scope of public order, that the two forces in Syria need to be merged, that Arab nationalism is strong in Syria, that what the Assad family has done in Syria is obvious, that if democratic conditions are not provided, Ahmed El-Shara could also turn into a dictator tomorrow... That if they leave Syria without civil society or local democracy, a new Hafez Assad will emerge, and that Syria should not be sacrificed to a new dictatorship..."

- "That a sharing model could be developed regarding oil resources and border gates..."

Bahçeli Also Accepted His Gift

Even though it became crystal clear that the parliamentary delegation returned from Imralı empty-handed, and it was understood that despite the negotiation/ceasefire rounds, the Syrian PKK had no intention of laying down their arms, what did MHP Leader Devlet Bahçeli do?

One day after the publication of the transcripts; he not only explained why he called the terrorist leader the "founding leader" by saying, "The shortest way to reach point B from point A is to draw a straight line. A curve lengthens your path. If point A is the Republic of Turkey, then point B is the founding leadership," but he also gave the following "good news" to the Turkish Nation regarding the "opening":

"Founding leader Abdullah Öcalan" sent a rug, which he had specially woven in Şanlıurfa, as a gift... He welcomed this with pleasure and thanked him "for his sincerity regarding Turkish-Kurdish unity and brotherhood"... Also, since every rug has a name in our culture, he named this rug the "February 27, 2025 Peace and Democracy rug"!..

Now let's go back to the beginning:

When were the three members of parliament sent to Imralı; on November 24...

When was the first 4-page transcript read; on December 4...

When was the terrorist leader's rug presented to Bahçeli; during the visit made by the DEM delegation on December 12...

What we mean is, in the words of former AKP member Mücahit Birinci; as of December 12, he was aware of "how this old pervert, this mentally ill person, this swindler with one foot in the grave was trying to swindle the parliamentary delegation on the fly," that he not only compared himself to Atatürk but also equated himself with Bahçeli, and that he did not make any call to the Syrian PKK. But despite all this, he accepted that rug with joy.

He accepted it, but why did he announce it not on the same day, but exactly 43 days later, specifically one day after the new 16-page transcript was published?

An important pro-government columnist interpreted the 16-page transcript and Bahçeli's rug announcement as follows:

"It can be estimated that this is a message to the Kandil-patented figures who want to leave Imralı out of the equation. Besides this, it can also be thought that it is related to managing the atmosphere of confusion/anger in Imralı. The result... Concrete examples show that Ankara has not given up on process management with Imralı!"

DEM co-chair Tuncer Bakırhan also claimed that the sharing of the transcripts with the public without asking the members of the commission in the Grand National Assembly of Turkey and without informing them was the result of a cheap political calculation, and that they were distorted, taken out of context, and edited, saying, "We think it was published to ensure that people form a negative opinion about Mr. Öcalan, but we think this is a futile effort."

In our opinion, however, each of these steps taken is nothing more than measuring the Turkish Nation's nerve level and testing its patience, and getting them to digest the pardon of the terrorist leader.

Following those two developments, Numan Kurtulmuş, the speaker of the TBMM and the PKK commission, announced that they had reached the final point in the joint report and that this report was a critical threshold for moving on to legal regulations.

Let's see what "good news" will come out of the joint report's hat!..

Müyesser YILDIZ

January 30, 2026