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For almost 30 years, Abdullah Ocalan called for his people to wage war against the Turkish state, CNN reported. 

On Thursday, the imprisoned founder of the banned Kurdistan Workers' Party made a historic call for dialogue with the government, as a letter from Ocalan was read in the Turkish Parliament.

"We for tens of years gave up our lives for this stuggle, we paid a price. We have come to a point at which the guns must be silent and ideas must talk," said the letter, read by Sirri Sureyya Onder of the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party, known as the BDP.

"I say in the witnesss of millions, a new period is beginning -- one in which not the gun, but politics is in the lead," the letter continued. "I say we have come to a point at which our armed elements should pull out of the borders. This is not giving up our struggle, it is about starting a new phase of struggle."

After decades of bloodshed from both sides that have cost tens of thousands of lives since 1984, there have been other recent signs of reconciliation.

In his ten years in power, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has loosened restrictions on expressions of Kurdish culture, which were forbidden for decades as being un-Turkish.

Over a week ago, Kurdish rebels handed over eight Turkish hostages in northern Iraq in a gesture of good will.

"This shows that there can be a democratic solution to the Kurdish issue," said Adil Kurt, a Parliament member from the BDP. He went to Iraq to help pick up the hostages and bring them back to Turkey.

The Kurdistan Workers' Party -- known by its initials in Kurdish, PKK -- is expected to begin leaving Turkish territory. It could announce that its armed wing will eventually lay down its weapons.