Abdullah Ocalan, the imprisoned Kurdish leader, called on his militant group on Thursday to lay down its arms and dissolve as part of a new bid to end a four-decade long conflict that has claimed tens of thousands of lives.

Abdullah Ocalan, imprisoned leader of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, on Thursday called for the group’s disarmament and disbandment. VOA Kurdish spoke to locals in Diyarbakir, Turkey’s largest Kurdish-majority city.

Founded by Ocalan in 1978, the PKK has led an insurgency in Turkey’s south-east since 1984. The group is considered a terrorist organisation by Turkey and its western allies. Previous peace efforts with the PKK have ended with failure — the most recent in 2015.