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ANKARA (AFP)
Kurdish officials in Turkey on Friday refuted
allegations that German tanks had been used against
civilians in the southeast of the country during a
15-year rebellion by the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
They were speaking to members of a German
parliamentary delegation made up of members of the
Greens, part of the ruling coalition in Germany.
"The mayors of towns in the region told us that
German tanks had not been used against (Kurdish)
civilians," said a member of a delegation who did
not wish to be named.
The lawmaker also said his delegation, which visited
Sirnak, Cizre and Idil -- all near the frontier with
Syria -- had found no evidence of the use of German
tanks in the region.
The accusations had been made by a former East
German military official who told a German
television station that German tanks had been
deployed by Turkish military police in the town of
Sirnak during the PKK rebellion between 1984 and
1999.
The allegations were rejected by the Turkish
government. The German government also said it had
no information that the accusations were true.
Confirmation of the use of tanks in the southeast of
Turkey would have contravened a 1994 treaty that
authorised the delivery of German tanks to Turkey on
condition they were not used in Kurdish areas of the
country.
All rights reserved. © 2004 Agence France-Presse.
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