Turks Report Heir to Ocalan

Turkey’s Kurdish rebels have taken steps toward choosing a new leader to replace jailed chief Abdullah Ocalan, a Turkish newspaper said Wednesday.

Milliyet said a meeting of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, appointed a senior commander, Cemil Bayik, as the guerrillas’ “high authority.”

Ocalan, who founded the Kurdish rebel movement and led its armed campaign for 14 years, was seized in Kenya last month and flown to Turkey for trial on treason charges.

But a PKK spokeswoman said the running of the guerrilla group had been taken over by a “presidential council” made up of former Ocalan advisors.