The PKK has "waged an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984", said Politico. Originally, it aimed to create an independent state for Kurds, an ethnic group of about 40 million people spread over Turkey, Iraq, Iran and Syria. Such independence was promised by the allied powers after the First World War, but never granted.

The Kurdish insurgent group PKK in Turkey says it will lay down its arms and disband after a decades-long fight that killed tens of thousands.

The Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militant group, which has been locked in bloody conflict with Turkey for more than four decades, has decided to disband and end its armed struggle, group members and Turkish leaders said on Monday.