- published: 23 Nov 2015
- views: 56735
The Kurdistan Workers' Party (Kurdish: Partiya Karkerên Kurdistan or پارتی کار کهرانی کوردستان Parti Karkerani Kurdistan), commonly known as PKK, also known as KGK and formerly known as KADEK (Freedom and Democracy Congress of Kurdistan) or KONGRA-GEL (Kurdistan People's Congress), is a Kurdish terrorist organization which has since 1984 been fighting an armed struggle against the Turkish state for an autonomous Kurdistan and greater cultural and political rights for the Kurds in Turkey. The group was founded on 27 November 1978 in the village of Fis, near Lice and was led by Abdullah Öcalan. The PKK's ideology was originally a fusion of revolutionary socialism and Kurdish nationalism - although since his imprisonment, Öcalan has abandoned orthodox Marxism. The PKK is listed as a terrorist organization internationally by a number of states and organizations, including the United States and the European Union. Turkey labeled the organization as an ethnic secessionist organization that uses terrorism and the threat of force against both civilian and military targets for the purpose of achieving its political goal.