Turkey – PB of the CC TKP/ML: Communist Leader İbrahim Kaypakkaya is the very Embodiment of Courage
We hereby share an unofficial translation of a statement by the Political Bureau (PB) of the Central Committee (CC) of the Communist Party of Turkey/Marxist-Leninist (TKP/ML) issued today.
Political Bureau of the Central Committee of the TKP/ML: Communist Leader İbrahim Kaypakkaya is the very embodiment of courage in the face of the enemy, hope in the face of defeat, and the faith and will to triumph in the face of despair!
Workers, youth, women, and comrades of various nationalities,
On the 53rd anniversary of the assassination of Comrade Ibrahim KAYPAKKAYA, the Communist Leader who revealed the nature of the Turkish revolution and the codes of its social and political structure on May 18, 1973, we once again declare our determination to follow in his footsteps.
We are living in a historical period in which the imperialist-capitalist system is imposing war, hunger, poverty, and a futureless existence on the peoples of the world with even greater recklessness. From the Middle East to Latin America, from the Balkans to Asia, and from Africa to Eastern Europe, the peoples of the world are being targeted by imperialist aggression, war-mongering, economic ruin, and fascist repressive policies. On a global scale, the ruling classes are attempting to overcome their crises by imposing even harsher living conditions on the working class, laborers, women, youth, and oppressed peoples.
In Turkey, fascism is trying to survive by intensifying repression, detentions, arrests, torture, poverty, and disorganization. The policy of denial and annihilation targeting the Kurdish nation continues. As workers resist for their most basic rights, they face State terrorism. Youth are condemned to a futureless existence, women to male-dominated violence, and peasants to plunder and impoverishment.
The AKP-MHP clique is expanding the support it receives from the ruling classes, in parallel with the determination shown by U.S. imperialism in its regional calculations. Backed more strongly by the support of the capitalist-landlord class, this dominant AKP-MHP clique continues to intensify its attacks—using the levers of power and all its might—against other cliques, primarily the CHP, in order to preserve its political power.
The AKP-MHP clique has fixated on the goal of dismantling and undermining the Kurds’ organizational structures, resistance forces, and tools for seeking rights and struggle under the guise of a “peaceful solution” to the Kurdish national question. A policy of reform and compromise has become the main course of the Kurdish National Movement. The “New Solution Process,” which began on October 22, 2024, has served as a cover for a series of insidious and treacherous attacks that restrict the Kurds’ national rights. The “New Solution Process” has functioned as an overt liquidation process.
This process constitutes a sharp attack on the idea of “armed struggle for liberation.”
This process is a denial of the necessity of the Right to Self-Determination for National Liberation.
This process is a scheme to enslave every part of Kurdistan and even more Kurds for the sake of the Turkish Republic’s reactionary regional interests.
This process amounts to a departure from the claim of democratization and the integration of Kurds into imperialism, fascism, and jihadist reactionary forces.
This process is the continued expansion of reactionary, oppressive, and denialist Turkish national sovereignty over the Kurdish nation.
We reject the solution sought through imperialism and its lackey, fascism. Against the status of an oppressed nation imposed on the Kurdish nation, we say: Long live the Kurdish nation’s right to self-determination. The Turkish nation will not be free unless the Kurdish nation is free, otherwise imperialism and fascism will be the victors.
While the AKP-MHP clique stokes chauvinism with its “national and local” rhetoric, it has ensured the further deepening of the Turkish Republic’s structure, which is deeply dependent on imperialism’s economic and political system. This is not a choice for them but the inevitable result of their class interests. This deepening dependence has led to greater decay and corruption in politics, culture, and the economy. This subservience to imperialism has cast even more darkness, uncertainty, and a lack of future prospects over the lives of the people.
Comrades,
In such a historical context, commemorating İbrahim KAYPAKKAYA is not merely a retrospective act of remembrance, but a matter of taking a stand and positioning ourselves within today’s class struggle.
Following the fascist coup of March 12, 1971, a massive assault was launched against the revolutionary movement. Torture chambers and prisons were filled, and revolutionaries were massacred. A mood of defeat was spreading, and surrender and despair were growing. It was precisely during such a period that İbrahim KAYPAKKAYA emerged. He did not accept defeat as fate. On the contrary, he took on the historical responsibility of clarifying the revolutionary line under conditions of defeat and raising the proletariat’s red flag even higher.
He was only 24 years old.
Comrade İbrahim is not merely a revolutionary leader of an era.
He is a straightforward communist leadership will that organizes revolutionary resolve under conditions of defeat, targets the order the rulers call “unchangeable,” and defends and organizes the communist line amidst fear and liquidationism.
He is the embodiment of a sharp break with Kemalism.
He is the audacity of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism against the cowardice that is “blind, deaf, and mute” regarding the Kurdish question.
He is the unwavering defender of the patient and victorious path of People’s War against left-wing adventurism.
This is the stance that strongly supports armed struggle against right-wing liquidationism.
It is the raising of the red flag of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution against class collaborationism, constitutionalism, and the defilement of the proletariat’s banner.
He is a Communist leader who, with his courage, theoretical clarity, and class consciousness, shattered the dominant “leftist” ideologies of his time, revealing the truth without compromise.
Guided by the science of Marxism-Leninism-Maoism, he founded the TKP/ML and charted the course of the Turkish revolution with the perspective of proletarian political power.
Comrades, friends;
KAYPAKKAYA’s strength lies not only in his theoretical analyses but in the unwavering consistency between his words and his actions. He lived as he wrote, and entered the fray of battle for the line he defended. He did not yield under torture. He gave his life but never revealed secrets. He became a symbol of Communist will, dedication, and revolutionary daring.
Today, the ruling classes are attempting to liquidate not only the revolutionary movement but the very idea of revolution itself. The propaganda that “great causes are over,” “revolution is impossible,” and “class struggle has lost its meaning” is being systematically spread.
, support the reactionary cliques under the guise of supporting those under attack.
Liberalism markets compromise, reformism markets surrender, parliamentarism markets being trapped within the system, and opportunism markets standing on those under attack by reactionary cliques – as “realism”. As U.S. imperialism escalates its aggressive actions targeting Venezuela, Iran, and Cuba, the reactionary nature of these States is forgotten, and opportunist deviations that view them as part of the anti-imperialist front are growing. Yes to directing the sharp end of the spear at the ruling clique and the aggressive power, but no to reactionary forces hostile to the people and to inconsistent “opposition” to imperialism.
These approaches amount to a belittling of the revolutionary claim. They erode the concept of armed struggle centered on an independent political line, the goal of political power, and the dictatorship of the proletariat through a flawed line of thought. Comrade İbrahim KAYPAKKAYA is an unwavering defender of the independent political line and action, and a relentless ideological enemy of any stance based on class compromise. We are passing through a dark tunnel where it is imperative to use this understanding of him as a guiding light on our path.
The oppressed peoples and nations are being told that imperialism and its system are invincible. In India, the People’s War is being targeted. In Palestine, a nation’s resistance—waged with stones, slingshots, nails, Molotov cocktails, and guns—is being attempted to be eradicated through genocide. In every part of Kurdistan, gains won through arms are being attempted to be surrendered through integration. The advice given to oppressed peoples and nations wherever they may be is: “Never engage in armed struggle from now on, because that era is over.”
This is precisely why İbrahim KAYPAKKAYA is more important today than ever.
Because KAYPAKKAYA embodies the refusal to abandon the revolution even under the harshest conditions, the trust in historical justice, the preservation of faith in the masses, and the commitment to the understanding that “power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”
He is the symbol of creating a perspective of victory in the midst of defeat, carrying the red flag in dark times, and strengthening the communist will in an age of despair.
KAYPAKKAYA’s line is one of steadfast commitment to the People’s War, the perspective of political power, the historical interests of the proletariat, and the struggle for the liberation of the oppressed. This line refuses to surrender the revolutionary struggle to reformism and defends the irreconcilable nature of the class struggle.
Comrades,
Our task today is not merely to commemorate him, but to understand him. For history has shown: Defeats are temporary. Liquidationism is corrosive. Despair is surrender. The communist will, however, is to be reborn time and again in the heart of the people, to defy defeats, to refuse to yield to despair, to face hardship head-on, and to not fear go against the tide.
Today, the contradictions of the masses are deepening, their anger is growing, and their search continues. The task of communists is to unite this search with the revolutionary line, organize it, and carry it into the struggle for political power.
The legacy of İbrahim KAYPAKKAYA lives on here.
That legacy is: never surrendering.
That legacy is: speaking the truth without fear.
That legacy is: protecting the belief in the people’s liberation under all circumstances.
That legacy is: never abandoning the goal to organize the revolution.
Today, we commemorate Communist Leader İbrahim KAYPAKKAYA by pledging our loyalty to his unwavering commitment to the proletariat’s line of political power—a commitment demonstrated through his communist resolve that did not yield under torture and his ideological struggle against revisionism.
We commemorate him with the awareness that we will move forward by following in his footsteps and that we will overcome difficulties to the extent that we grasp his legacy; we still commemorate and embrace him, and we will continue to do so.
STRENGTHEN THE COMMUNIST RANKS AGAINST CONCILIATION!
GRASP MARXISM-LENINISM-MAOISM AGAINST DESPAIR!
RAISE THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR AGAINST IMPERIALISM AND ITS REACTIONARY WAR!
ARM YOURSELF WITH PROLETARIAN INTERNATIONALISM AGAINST SOCIAL CHAUVINISM AND CLASS COLLABORATION!
MARCH FORWARD WITH RESOLVE ON THE PATH OF COMMUNIST LEADER İBRAHİM KAYPAKKAYA AGAINST LIQUIDATIONISM!
WIN THE NEW DEMOCRATIC REVOLUTION THROUGH PEOPLE’S WAR AGAINST SURRENDER!
LONG LIVE OUR PARTY TKP/ML, THE PEOPLE’S ARMY TİKKO, AND THE YOUTH ORGANIZATION TMLGB, UNDER ITS LEADERSHIP!
MAY 2026
TKP/ML CC-PB
(Turkish Communist Party/Marxist-Leninist
Political Bureau of the Central Committee)
