Turkey Moves Abdullah Ocalan to Newly Built Section of Imrali Prison

Turkey has moved Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, to a newly built section of the prison on Imrali Island. Mithat Sancar, a lawmaker from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Equality and Democracy Party, confirmed the relocation in an interview with Medya Haber TV on 31 October.

Ocalan has been held on Imrali, in the Sea of Marmara, since his capture in 1999. Improving the conditions of his detention has been one of the main Kurdish demands in the current effort to end the 42-year conflict between the PKK and the Turkish state. Sancar did not give details of the new accommodation but said the move requires the peace process to accelerate. He described the process as having been on pause for the last two months.

Earlier reporting indicated that a residence of roughly 250 square metres had been constructed inside the Imrali complex. Nationalist Movement Party leader Devlet Bahceli, whose party supports the government and who has been central to the latest peace initiative, acknowledged the construction in September. He said the facility was intended to ease communication rather than to alter Ocalan’s life sentence. Ocalan had reportedly declined to move until he was given a defined role in the process.

Sancar is among the DEM Party politicians who have visited Ocalan regularly since the PKK leader called on the group to disband and disarm in February 2025. Those visits have continued even as the broader negotiations have slowed. Ocalan remains an influential figure among many Kurds, and Turkish officials have treated his statements as relevant to the PKK’s willingness to complete disarmament.

The transfer occurs against a background of partial amnesty legislation that would suspend sentences for many people convicted of PKK membership but would not cover Ocalan himself because of the date and seriousness of his convictions. The PKK has demanded his release as part of dissolution; Turkish public opinion has remained strongly opposed to that step. The new prison section therefore represents a limited adjustment to conditions while leaving the life sentence in place.

Whether the relocation produces faster progress on the remaining issues—disarmament timelines, the status of PKK members outside Turkey, and the legal status of the process itself—depends on how both sides treat the next set of statements from Imrali. Sancar’s call for acceleration indicates that the Kurdish side views the move as insufficient without corresponding movement on the political track.