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DIYARBAKIR, Turkey, June 27 (AFP) - 18h40 -
Clashes broke out between riot police and
demonstrators at the funeral here Monday of a
suspected Kurdish separatist militant killed in a
clash last week, security sources said.
They and eyewitnesses said a group of about 500
mourners and sympathizers of the outlawed Kurdistan
Workers' Party (PKK) began a march through this
southeastern city after the funeral service and were
stopped by riot police.
The demonstrators, chanting slogans in favor of
jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan, refused to
disperse and scuffles broke out, with police using
batons and tear gas to break up the demonstration.
Police said three people were injured and five taken
into custody, but eyewitnesses said a further 10
people or so were hospitalized for tear gas
inhalation.
The funeral was for one of five PKK militants killed
in fighting Friday in the mountains of Bingol
province, where they fled after a gunbattle the
previous day in neighboring Tunceli province, where
one soldier was wounded.
Violence in the region has sharply increased over
the past few months, after the PKK called off a
five-year unilateral truce in June 2004 on grounds
that reforms undertaken by Ankara to expand Kurdish
freedoms were insufficient.
The Kurdish conflict in Turkey has claimed about
37,000 lives, most of them between 1984 and 1999,
when the PKK, considered a terror group by both the
United States and the European Union, waged a bloody
campaign for Kurdish self-rule in the region.
AFP
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