By Ako Rasheed SULAYMANIYAH, Iraq (Reuters) -Thirty Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants burned their weapons at the mouth of a cave in northern Iraq on Friday, marking a symbolic but significant step toward ending a decades-long insurgency against Turkey.

The ceremony took place under tight security at a cave in Iraqi Kurdistan - the disarmament process is expected to last all summer.

A ceremony in northern Iraq on Friday saw a handful of Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants lay down their weapons, a small but hugely symbolic gesture that marks the beginning of an end to a conflict with the Turkish state that’s lasted nearly five decades and cost tens of thousands of lives.

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday said that the formation of a parliamentary commission will be a “first step” in peace talks between Turkey and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK),

SULAYMANIYAH, Iraq (Reuters) -Dozens of Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants began handing over weapons in a ceremony in a cave in northern Iraq on Friday, officials said, marking a symbolic but significant step toward ending a decades-long insurgency against Turkey.

The group of 30 members burned their weapons in a cauldron in Iraq. The group has been fighting with Turkey for 40 years.

ISTANBUL - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Saturday called for full support of the disarmament of Kurdish militants that began with a handover of the first batch of weapons by Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) forces,

After announcing they would disarm, the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) destroyed their weapons in northern Iraq.

SULAIMANIYAH (Iraq) (AFP) – 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.