So why is Öcalan important – not just for you but for someone who isn’t Kurdish, like me? Why are internationalists marching across Europe through the winter weather, calling for Öcalan’s freedom?

And why was his case brought up in three different speeches in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe just this week?

We all recognise his importance, of course, as Kurdish people’s leader.

We all recognise his importance for a peaceful solution to the Kurdish Question and for democracy in Turkey, just in the same way as we recognised the importance of Mandela for ending apartheid.

But we also find in his ideas a possibility of a better future for everyone,

and for me that’s what brought me to work for the movement.

And I thought I’d just tell you how I got involved.

I think like very many people, it was the time of the attack on Kobanê. There were very many films on the television with lots of pictures of pretty women with guns. OK, it was very nice, they were fighting against ISIS, but what got me excited was when there was a film that showed not just that they were fighting ISIS, but what people were building on the ground in Rojava. And I realised that while in Scotland we were talking about building a better future, here people were actually getting on and building one. So that’s how I got involved.

But today, the living practice of Öcalan’s ideas in Rojava is under a massive threat,

and Öcalan himself has not been heard of three years.

For all these issues we need to raise our voices for Öcalan’s freedom:

for the Kurdish people

for peace in the Middle East

and for a better future for the world Bijî Serok Apo!