JAILED Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) leader Abdullah Ocalan called for an end to hunger strikes in protest at his isolation today after meeting with his lawyers for the first time in almost nine years.

A letter seen by the Morning Star and signed by the Kurdish leader was read out by his legal team at an eagerly awaited press conference in Istanbul this afternoon.  

He wrote that he although he “respects the resistance of friends inside and outside prison” he asked them to not to carry hunger strikes to the stage where they will “endanger their health and will lead them to death.”