Rome - A former ally of Abdullah Ocalan described the Kurdish rebel leader in an Italian newspaper interview published yesterday as a "miserable wretch" who had betrayed his people to save his own life.
La Stampa quoted Mr Kemal Kara, Ocalan's former Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) spokesman in Italy, as saying: "You have backed down. You no longer represent the Kurds who are reorganising in Europe and Iraq to renew the fight for the Kurdistan which you have betrayed."