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Thirty PKK fighters destroyed their weapons at a symbolic ceremony in Iraqi Kurdistan on Friday, two months after the Kurdish rebels ended their decades-long armed struggle against the Turkish state.The ceremony marked a major step in the transition of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) from armed insurgency to democratic politics as part of a broader effort to end one of the region’s longest-running conflicts.Analysts say that with the PKK weakened and the Kurdish public exhausted by decades of violence, Turkey’s peace offer handed its jailed founder Abdullah Ocalan a chance to make the long-desired switch away from armed struggle.  The PKK’s disarmament also grants President Recep Tayyip Erdogan the distinction of being the Turkish leader who managed to draw a line under a conflict that has cost more than 40,000 lives and wrought havoc in Turkey and beyond. Outside the ancient cave of Casene, a group of 30 PKK fighters, men and women, gathered on a stage in khaki fatigues, their faces uncovered, in front of an audience of around 300 people, an AFP correspondent reported. One by one, they walked down to lay their weapons in a cauldron in which a fire was lit. Most were rifles but there was one machine gun and a rocket-propelled grenade launcher. As they looked on, people in the crowd started cheering while others could be heard weeping. After the ceremony, the fighters returned to the mountains, a PKK commander said.- Ocalan’s freedom ‘essential’ -Speaking to AFP after the ceremony, the PKK’s top female commander Bese Hozat said that for the process to succeed, it was essential to release Ocalan — known to his followers as ‘Apo’ — who has been serving life in solitary confinement since 1999. “Ensuring Leader Apo’s physical freedom via legal guarantees is essential… he should be able to freely lead and manage this process. This is our primary condition and demand,” she said. “Without this development, it is highly unlikely that the process will continue successfully.”Erdogan hailed the ceremony as an “important step” on the path to a “terror-free Turkey”, expressing hope it would lead to “the establishment of lasting peace in our region”. A senior Turkish official source described it as “an irreversible turning point”, saying the move to decommission weapons was part of a broader process that would ultimately involve the legal return of former fighters and their reintegration into society. PKK militants have insisted on the need for legal reform in Turkey to allow them to return home and engage in democratic politics, commander Hozat told AFP. “If Turkey… enacts laws and implements radical legal reforms… we will go to Turkey and engage in politics,” she said. “If there is no legal constitutional arrangements, we will either end up in prison or being killed.”- ‘New era’ for Kurds -Turkey’s pro-Kurdish DEM party, which played a key role in facilitating contacts between Ocalan and Ankara, hailed the ceremony as the start of a “new era for the Kurdish issue”. It also filed a legal petition for the release of former top pro-Kurdish politician Selahattin Demirtas, who was jailed in 2016 and sentenced last year to 42 years for his alleged role in a series of deadly 2014 protests. France’s foreign ministry said it welcomed Friday’s ceremony, adding it hoped the PKK’s dissolution would “be effective and verifiable”, bring an end to the violence, and “give rise to an inclusive political process”.The PKK took up arms in 1984, beginning a string of bloody attacks on Turkish soil.But more than four decades on, the PKK in May announced its dissolution and said it would pursue a democratic struggle to defend the rights of the Kurdish minority in line with a historic call by Ocalan.Earlier this week, Ocalan said the disarmament process would be “implemented swiftly”.In recent months, the PKK has taken several historic steps, starting with a ceasefire and culminating in its formal dissolution announced on May 12.The shift followed a historic appeal at the end of February by Ocalan, 76, who has spent the past 26 years behind bars. 

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli forces killed at least 30 people on Friday, including 10 who were waiting for aid in the south of the war-ravaged territory. The latest deaths came as the United Nations said nearly 800 people had been killed trying to access food in Gaza since late May, when Israel began easing a more than two-month blockade on deliveries.UN human rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said most of the deaths occurred near facilities operated by the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.”We’ve recorded now 798 killings, including 615 in the vicinity of the GHF sites,” from the time the group’s operations began in late May until July 7, Shamdasani said on Friday. An officially private effort, GHF operations have been marred by chaotic scenes and frequent reports of Israeli forces firing on people waiting to collect rations.UN agencies and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the foundation over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives and violates basic humanitarian principles.Responding to the UN’s figures, Israel’s military said it had worked to minimise “possible friction between the population and the (army) as much as possible”.”Following incidents in which harm to civilians who arrived at distribution facilities was reported, thorough examinations were conducted… and instructions were issued to forces in the field following lessons learned,” it said.Gaza civil defence official Mohammed al-Mughayyir said that 10 people were shot by Israeli forces on Friday while waiting for supplies in the Al-Shakoush area northwest of Rafah, where there have been repeated reports of deadly fire on aid seekers. – ‘Extremely difficult’ -In an update, the civil defence agency reported a wave of Israeli air strikes, drone attacks and bombings across the densely populated territory, which has been devastated by 21 months of war.There was no immediate comment on the latest strikes from the Israeli military, which has recently expanded its operations across Gaza.Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency and other parties.A Palestinian speaking to AFP from southern Gaza on condition of anonymity reported ongoing attacks and widespread devastation, with Israeli tanks seen near Khan Yunis.”The situation remains extremely difficult in the area — intense gunfire, intermittent air strikes, artillery shelling, and ongoing bulldozing and destruction of displacement camps and agricultural land to the south, west and north of Al-Maslakh,” an area to Khan Yunis’s south, the witness said.The Israeli military said its soldiers were operating in the area, dismantling “terrorist infrastructure sites, both above and below ground”, and seizing “weapons and military equipment”.The civil defence also reported five people killed in an Israeli strike the previous night on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Jabalia al-Nazla, in northern Gaza. Nearly all of Gaza’s population has been displaced at least once during the war, which has created dire humanitarian conditions for the territory’s more than two million inhabitants.Many have sought shelter in school buildings, but these have come under repeated Israeli attack, with the military often saying it was targeting Hamas militants hiding among civilians.bur-mib-phz-acc/kir

Kurdish militants want to return to Turkey and enter mainstream politics, one of the PKK’s joint leaders told AFP on Friday after the group’s fighters began destroying their arms at a ceremony in Iraq.Speaking to AFP after handing in her own weapon alongside 29 of her comrades, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party’s top female commander Bese Hozat said if Turkey were willing, the disarmament process could be completed very quickly. But the 47-year-old militant also warned the fragile peace process risked being derailed if Ankara fails to free the PKK’s jailed founder Abdullah Ocalan, also known as ‘Apo’ — Kurdish for ‘uncle’.”If Apo were freed tomorrow and… Turkey made legal and constitutional arrangements the next day, within a week we could return to engage in democratic politics,” she said of a process which Ankara expects to last for months. Ocalan has been serving a life sentence in solitary confinement on the prison island of Imrali near Istanbul since 1999 and his release has been a constant demand of the PKK. – ‘We miss him very much’ – “Ensuring leader Apo’s physical freedom legally, via legal guarantees, is essential…  he should be able to freely lead and manage this process. This is our primary condition and demand,” she said. “We want to see him, we miss him very much and there are many things we want to discuss with him,” said Hozat, who joined the PKK when she was 16 and has spent more than three decades of her life as a fighter. “Without this development, it is highly unlikely that the process will continue successfully.”Earlier this week, the 76-year-old dismissed talk of his own release as unimportant, positioning himself more as a guide than as a leader of the ongoing process. Hozat said it was essential Turkey put in place mechanisms to allow them to return without fear of prosecution or reprisal. “We do not want to wage armed struggle against Turkey, we want to come to Turkey and do democratic politics. In order for us… to achieve democratic integration with Turkey, it is imperative we can freely travel to Turkey,” she said. “If Turkey takes concrete steps, enacts laws and implements radical legal reforms… we will go to Turkey and engage in politics. If (not)… we will end up either in prison or being killed.”- ‘The PKK no longer exists’ -Asked whether she now expected Turkey and its Western allies to remove the PKK from their blacklists of terrorist organisations, Hozat said the issue was irrelevant. “Right now, the PKK no longer exists, we’ve dissolved it. We are a freedom movement.. advocating for peace and a democratic society.”The PKK has achieved its main goal: the existence of the Kurds has been recognised.” Seen as the world’s largest stateless people, the Kurds were left without a country when the Ottoman Empire collapsed after World War I. Although most live in Turkey, where they make up around a fifth of the population, the Kurds are also spread across Iraq, Iran and Syria, where Ankara has for years been striking Kurdish fighters. Hozat hailed positive changes in Syria since the PKK announced the end of its armed struggle against Turkey.”Turkish attacks on (Kurdish-majority) northeastern Syria have ceased and its autonomous administration is currently negotiating” with the Damascus government.Hozat said the Kurdish question was the key to freedom for all peoples of the Middle East. “If the Kurdish question is resolved, the Middle East can truly become a democracy,” she said. “That’s why we want this solution everywhere, including Iran, which must also become democratic. The Kurdish question must also be resolved there on the basis of autonomy.”

Doctors Without Borders warned Friday that its teams on the ground in Gaza were witnessing surging levels of acute malnutrition in the besieged and war-ravaged Palestinian territory.The medical charity, known by its French acronym MSF, said levels of acute malnutrition had reached an “all-time high” at two of its facilities in the Gaza Strip.”MSF teams are witnessing a sharp and unprecedented rise in acute malnutrition among people in Gaza,” the organisation said in a statement.”In Al-Mawasi clinic, southern Gaza, and the MSF Gaza Clinic in the north, we are seeing the highest number of malnutrition cases ever recorded by our teams in the Strip.”MSF said it now had more than 700 pregnant and breastfeeding women and nearly 500 children with severe and moderate malnutrition currently enrolled in ambulatory therapeutic feeding centres in both clinics.The numbers at the Gaza City clinic had almost quadrupled in under two months, from 293 cases in May to 983 cases at the start of this month, it said.”This is the first time we have witnessed such a severe scale of malnutrition cases in Gaza,” Mohammed Abu Mughaisib, MSF’s deputy medical coordinator in Gaza, said in the statement.- ‘Intentional’ starvation -“The starvation of people in Gaza is intentional,” he charged, insisting that “it can end tomorrow if the Israeli authorities allow food in at scale”.Starting in March, Israel blocked deliveries of food and other crucial supplies into Gaza for more than two months, leading to warnings of famine across a territory widely flattened by Israeli bombing since Hamas’s deadly October 7, 2023 attack on Israel.Israel began allowing food supplies to trickle in at the end of May, but using a new US- and Israel-backed organisation called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF).That group’s operations, which effectively sidelined a vast UN aid delivery network in Gaza, have been marred by chaotic scenes and near-daily reports of Israeli forces firing on people waiting to collect rations.The UN said Friday that at least 615 people had been killed in the vicinity of GHF sites since May 27. The organisation itself denies that fatal shootings have occurred in the immediate vicinity of its aid points.MSF maintained Friday that “the existence of malnutrition in Gaza is the result of deliberate, calculated choices by the Israeli authorities”.They have decided, it said, to “restrict the entry of food to the bare minimum for survival, dictate and militarise the means of its subsequent distribution, all while having destroyed the majority of local food production capacity”.MSF described how injured patients at its clinics warned that its malnourished patients were “begging for food instead of medicine, their wounds failing to close due to protein deficiency”.Far more babies were also being born prematurely, while six-month pregnant women often weighed no more than 40 kilos (88 pounds), it said.”The situation is beyond critical,” said MSF doctor Joanne Perry.

Ten Palestinians were reported killed Friday waiting for rations in Gaza, adding to the nearly 800 killed seeking aid in the last six weeks, according to the UN, with Israel’s army saying it issued troops new instructions following the repeated reports of deaths.Friday’s violence came as negotiators from Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas were locked in indirect talks in Qatar to try to agree on a temporary ceasefire in the more than 21-month conflict.Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Thursday that he hoped a deal for a 60-day pause in the war could be struck in the coming days, and that he would then be ready to negotiate a more permanent end to hostilities.Hamas has said the free flow of aid is one of the main sticking points in the talks, with Gaza’s more than two million residents facing a dire humanitarian crisis due to the effects of war, including hunger and disease.Israel began easing a more than two-month total blockade in late May and since then, a new US- and Israel-backed organisation called the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) has effectively sidelined the territory’s vast UN-led aid delivery network.There are frequent reports of Israeli forces firing on people seeking aid, with Gaza’s civil defence agency saying the latest incident on Friday claimed the lives of 10 Palestinians waiting near a distribution point around the southern city of Rafah.The UN, which refuses to cooperate with GHF over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives, said Friday that 798 people had been killed seeking aid between late May and July 7, including 615 “in the vicinity of the GHF sites”.”Where people are lining up for essential supplies such as food and medicine, and where… they have a choice between being shot or being fed, this is unacceptable,” UN rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani told reporters in Geneva.Israel’s military did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Friday’s deaths, but it has previously accused militants of firing at civilians in the vicinity of aid centres.Asked about the UN figures, the military said it had worked to minimise “possible friction” between aid seekers and soldiers, and that it conducted “thorough examinations” of incidents in which “harm to civilians who arrived at distribution facilities was reported”.”Instructions were issued to forces in the field following lessons learned,” it added in a statement.GHF called the UN report “false and misleading”, claiming that “most deadly attacks on aid sites have been linked to UN convoys”.Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify tolls and details provided by the agency and other parties.- Truce talks -In Gaza’s south, a witness said Israeli tanks were seen near Khan Yunis, reporting “intense gunfire, intermittent air strikes, artillery shelling, and ongoing bulldozing and destruction of displacement camps and agricultural land”.Israel’s military confirmed troops were operating in the area against “terrorist infrastructure sites, both above and below ground”.Hamas has said that as part of a potential truce deal it was willing to release 10 of the hostages taken during its attack on Israel on October 7, 2023, which sparked the Gaza war.Netanyahu, who is under pressure to end the war after mounting military losses, said that would leave 10 living hostages still in captivity.”I hope we can complete it in a few days,” he added of the initial ceasefire agreement and hostage release in an interview with US outlet Newsmax.”We’ll probably have a 60-day ceasefire, get the first batch out, then use the 60-day ceasefire to negotiate an end to this.”Netanyahu has said that a key condition of any deal is that Hamas first gives up its weapons and its hold on Gaza, warning that failure to do so on Israel’s terms would lead to further conflict.Another issue holding up a deal is disagreement on the number of Palestinian prisoners to be released in exchange for hostages, Foreign Minister Gideon Saar has said.Hamas has said it wants “real guarantees” for a lasting truce and Israel’s full withdrawal from Gaza, and that it opposes any Israeli moves to push Palestinians into “isolated enclaves”.The group’s 2023 attack on Israel led to the deaths of 1,219 people, most of them civilians, according to an AFP tally based on Israeli figures.Out of 251 hostages seized in the attack, 49 are still held in Gaza, including 27 the Israeli military says are dead.At least 57,762 Palestinians, most of them civilians, have been killed since the start of the war, according to the health ministry in Hamas-run Gaza.

Gaza’s civil defence agency said Israeli forces killed 18 people on Friday, including 10 who were waiting for aid in the south of the war-ravaged territory. The fresh deaths came as the United Nations said nearly 800 people had been killed trying to access food in Gaza since late May, when Israel began easing a more than two-month total blockade on supplies.UN rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said most of the deaths occurred near facilities operated by the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation.”We’ve recorded now 798 killings, including 615 in the vicinity of the GHF sites,” from the time the group’s operations began in late May until July 7, Shamdasani said Friday. An officially private effort, GHF operations have been marred by chaotic scenes and frequent reports of Israeli forces firing on people waiting to collect rations.The UN and major aid groups have refused to cooperate with the foundation over concerns it was designed to cater to Israeli military objectives and violates basic humanitarian principles.Responding to the UN’s figures, Israel’s military said it had worked to minimise “possible friction between the population and the IDF forces as much as possible”.”Following incidents in which harm to civilians who arrived at distribution facilities was reported, thorough examinations were conducted… and instructions were issued to forces in the field following lessons learned,” it added.Gaza civil defence official Mohammed al-Mughayyir said that 10 people were shot by Israeli forces on Friday while waiting for supplies in the Al-Shakoush area northwest of Rafah, where there are regular reports of deadly fire on aid seekers. – ‘Extremely difficult’ -The civil defence reported six more people killed in four separate Israeli air strikes in the area of Khan Yunis, in the south of the territory. Two drone strikes around Gaza City in the north killed two more people, civil defence spokesman Mahmud Bassal told AFP. There was no immediate comment on the latest strikes from the Israeli military, which has recently expanded its operations across Gaza.Media restrictions in Gaza and difficulties in accessing many areas mean AFP is unable to independently verify the tolls and details provided by the civil defence agency and other parties.A Palestinian speaking to AFP from southern Gaza on condition of anonymity reported ongoing attacks and widespread devastation, with Israeli tanks seen near Khan Yunis.”The situation remains extremely difficult in the area — intense gunfire, intermittent air strikes, artillery shelling, and ongoing bulldozing and destruction of displacement camps and agricultural land to the south, west and north of Al-Maslakh,” an area to Khan Yunis’s south, said the witness.Israel’s military said in a statement that its soldiers were operating in the area, dismantling “terrorist infrastructure sites, both above and below ground”, and seizing “weapons and military equipment”.The civil defence also reported on Friday five people killed in an Israeli strike the previous night on a school sheltering displaced Palestinians in Jabalia al-Nazla, in northern Gaza. Nearly all of Gaza’s population has been displaced at least once during the more than 21-month war, which has created dire humanitarian conditions for the more than two million people living there.Many have sought shelter in school buildings, but these have repeatedly come under Israeli attack, with the military often saying they were targeting Hamas militants hiding among civilians.bur-mib-phz-acc/smw

Yemen’s Huthi rebels have resumed their attacks on Red Sea shipping, saying they aim to force Israel to cease fire in Gaza  — a move that threatens a truce with Washington and rattles maritime trade.The Iran-backed rebels allege that the two vessels they attacked earlier this week — the Magic Seas and the Eternity C — were linked to trade with Israel.But their renewed campaign comes at a pivotal moment when Washington and Tehran are weighing talks following a devastating 12-day Iran-Israel war, while Hamas and Israel are holding truce negotiations in Qatar.What’s at stake for the rebels and why have they decided to resume attacks after a gap of more than six months?- Why now? -The rebels, who have also mounted direct attacks on Israel, have launched more than 100 attacks on vessels in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden since November 2023, according to the Joint Maritime Information Centre run by Western navies.They paused their attacks during a short-lived Gaza truce earlier this year before renewing them last weekend.The rebels say their aim is to support Palestinians in Gaza. Their political leader, Mahdi al-Mashat, told Hamas negotiators in Doha to “negotiate with your heads held high, for we are with you and all the resources of our people will support you” until the war ends.But analysts say their resumption of attacks goes beyond support for Gaza.It comes shortly after Iran fought a devastating war with Israel without support from its allies in the so-called “axis of resistance”, which also includes Hamas and Lebanon’s Hezbollah.”This is a reminder from the Revolutionary Guard, through its most important ally (the Huthis), that what was withheld in the previous round (of fighting), if repeated, can be activated,” said the chairperson of the Sanaa Center for Strategic Studies, Maged al-Madhaji.Noam Raydan, who tracks maritime attacks for the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, said the Huthis had continued to monitor ship movements throughout the pause in attacks.”They’ve ensured that their presence is always felt”, she said.- What are they hoping to achieve? -Although Iran is their main backer, the Huthis are not just a Tehran proxy: they have ambitions of their own and dreams of a broader regional role.Farea Al-Muslimi, a research fellow at British think tank Chatham House, described the attacks as a “power move” that enabled the Huthis to “project more power regionally and internationally”.Israel’s wars in Gaza and Lebanon have severely weakened both Hamas and Hezbollah, leaving the Huthis as the only member of the “axis of resistance” to emerge relatively unscathed.The rebels have endured repeated air strikes by Israel in response to their drone and missile attacks. Washington too carried out an intensive bombing campaign earlier this year before agreeing to cease fire in May in return for an end to Huthi attacks on international shipping.”While the US campaign badly hit the Huthis’ communication and some military capabilities, they still have huge stock and rebuilt their communications quickly,” said Muslimi, adding that their maritime power “has been booming”.He said that in comparison with their attacks on Israel, which had had only limited success, the Huthis’ attacks on shipping had proved “a very efficient way to make the entire West, and most of the east, bleed.”- What are the risks? -The Huthis’ campaign has caused major disruption to the vital shipping lane through the Bab al-Mandeb strait and the Red Sea that normally carries about 12 percent of global trade.With insurance premiums skyrocketing, many shipping firms have opted to make the time-consuming detour around the southern tip of Africa instead.”Transit via the Bab al-Mandeb strait remains low compared to 2023 – a drop by over 50 percent,” Raydan told AFP.She said the rebels had taken advantage of a decreased naval presence in the area to mount their attacks.”The Huthis appear to have more freedom now to assault freedom of navigation,” she said.The future of a fragile ceasefire with the United States meant to ensure freedom of navigation in the Red Sea is now uncertain.Israeli Foreign Minister Gideon Saar called for action to stop further Huthi attacks.”If the Huthis are not confronted, this problem will only grow,” he warned.

Nearly 800 people have died trying to access aid in Gaza since late May, with most killed near the US- and Israel-backed Gaza Humanitarian Foundation’s sites, the UN said Friday.An officially private effort, the Gaza Humanitarian Foundation (GHF) began operations on May 26 after Israel halted supplies into the Gaza Strip for more than two months, sparking warnings of imminent famine.Since those operations began and through July 7, United Nations rights office spokeswoman Ravina Shamdasani said the agency had recorded “615 killings in the vicinity of the GHF sites”.Another 183 people had been killed “presumably on the routes of aid convoys” carried out by UN and other aid organisations, she told reporters in Geneva.”This is nearly 800 people who have been killed while trying to access aid,” she said, adding that “most of the injuries are gunshot injuries”.GHF operations, which effectively sidelined a vast UN aid delivery network in Gaza, have been marred by chaotic scenes and near-daily reports of Israeli forces firing on people waiting to collect rations.The GHF, which said Thursday it had distributed more than 69 million meals to date, has denied that fatal shootings have occurred in the immediate vicinity of its aid points.The Israeli army has accused Hamas of being responsible for firing at civilians in the vicinity of aid centres.The army said Friday it had issued instructions to Israel’s forces in the field “following lessons learned” after reports of deadly incidents at distribution facilities.It explained that it “allows the American civilian organisation (GHF) to distribute aid to Gaza residents independently, and operates in proximity to the new distribution zones to enable the distribution alongside the continuation of IDF operational activities in the Gaza Strip”.”As part of this effort, IDF forces have recently worked to reorganise the area through the installation of fences, signage placement, the opening of additional routes, and other measures,” it said.The army stressed that “following incidents in which harm to civilians who arrived at distribution facilities was reported, thorough examinations were conducted,” adding those incidents were “under review by the competent authorities in the IDF”.Shamdasani highlighted that the UN rights office had repeatedly raised “serious concerns about respect for international humanitarian law principles” in the war in Gaza, which erupted following Hamas’s deadly October 7, 2023 attack inside Israel.”Where people are lining up for essential supplies such as food and medicine, and where they are being attacked, where… they have a choice between being shot or being fed, this is unacceptable,” she said.