After announcing a "historic declaration" on Thursday, Abdullah Ocalan, the jailed leader of the separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) , called upon the militant group to lay down its arms and dissolve itself.

This would mark the end of decades of violence between the PKK and the Turkish state. Here's what you need to know.

The PKK was founded in 1978 with the goal of establishing an independent, socialist-orientated Kurdish state in the Middle East. Later, it softened this goal and instead called for the recognition of Kurdish identity, as well as political and cultural autonomy in areas predominantly settled by Kurds.

There are an estimated 30 million Kurds living worldwide, which makes them the largest ethnic group without a state of their own. Kurdish minorities primarily live in southeastern Turkey, northern Iraq, Iran, and northern Syria.

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As a militant organization, the PKK launched an armed campaign against Turkey in 1984 from northern Iraq. Turkey, the European Union (EU) and the United States consider the PKK to be a terrorist organization. In Germany, the group has been banned since 1993.

Germany is home to a large Kurdish diaspora, with about 14,500 PKK supporters according to German security officials.

It's estimated that the armed conflict between the PKK and the Turkish state has killed over 40,000 individuals, many of them civilians. In the........

© Deutsche Welle