The People's Defence Forces ( ku, Hêzên Parastina Gel, HPG) is the military wing of the group
Kurdistan Workers' Party
The Kurdistan Workers' Party or PKK is a Kurdish militant political organization and armed guerrilla movement, which historically operated throughout Kurdistan, but is now primarily based in the mountainous Kurdish-majority regions of sout ...
(PKK). During the 7th Congress of the PKK in January 2000, the HPG replaced the former military wing of the PKK, the People's Liberation Army of Kurdistan (''Artêşa Rizgariya Gelê Kurdistan'', ARGK). The replacement was intended to demonstrate the search for a peaceful solution of the
Kurdish-Turkish conflict, after the capture of
Abdullah Öcalan in 1999.
The HPG played an active in the
peace negotiations between the Turkish Government and the PKK in 2013, as it hosted a delegation consisting of several politicians from the
Peace and Democracy Party
The Peace and Democracy Party ( tr, Barış ve Demokrasi Partisi, ku, Partiya Aştî û Demokrasiyê, BDP) was a Kurdish political party in Turkey existing from 2008 to 2014.
Development
BDP succeeded the Democratic Society Party (DTP) in 20 ...
(BDP) and members of the
Turkish Human Rights Association (IHD) and agreed to release soldiers of the Turkish army as well as a Turkish politician, who they held captive. In 2014, the HPG was involved in the fight against the
Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant
An Islamic state is a state that has a form of government based on Islamic law (sharia). As a term, it has been used to describe various historical polities and theories of governance in the Islamic world. As a translation of the Arabic term ...
(ISIS) in
Sinjar
Sinjar ( ar, سنجار, Sinjār; ku, شنگال, translit=Şingal, syr, ܫܝܓܪ, Shingar) is a town in the Sinjar District of the Nineveh Governorate in northern Iraq. It is located about five kilometers south of the Sinjar Mountains. Its p ...
.
As far as can be judged from the publications, one of the basic HPG factions is called "Karela Forces" (or "Al-Karila Forces") and this name mainly mentioned in Arabic texts regarding HPG actions in northern Iraq and Turkey (in Arabic texts, this name is often used as an alternative name for People's Defence Forces in general.)
References
{{Authority control
Apoist organizations in Turkey
Anti-ISIL factions in Iraq
Anti-ISIL factions in Turkey
Military wings of socialist parties
Organisations designated as terrorist by the United Kingdom
Organizations based in Asia designated as terrorist
Organizations designated as terrorist
Rebel groups in Turkey