SULAIMANIYAH,
Kurdistan-Iraq, - A former leading member of
Turkey’s Kurdish PKK guerrilla group died yesterday
when his car caught fire in the city of Sulaimaniyah
in Kurdistan (Northern Iraq), police said.
Kani Yilmaz a Kurd and his bodyguard burned to death
in a blaze which a preliminary investigation
suggested was ignited by an electrical fault in the
engine, Sulaimaniyah security chief Sarkwat Hassan
said.
Hassan stressed the cause of the fire was still
under investigation.
The CNN Turk Web site said Yilmaz’s car blew up as
it left a petrol station. Police said a child
passing by was injured.
Yilmaz was once a member of the PKK’s central
committee and its representative in Europe, but
broke away to become the spokesman for the Patriotic
Democratic Party of Kurdistan, which rejects
violence.
The PKK is fighting for self-rule in Turkey’s mainly
Kurdish southeast.
Kani Yilmaz was a nom de guerre, his original name
being Faysal Dunlayici.
After PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan was captured in
1999, Yilmaz failed in attempts to secure asylum in
European countries and withdrew to the mountains of
Kurdistan (northern Iraq).
Some 37,000 people have been killed since the PKK,
listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the
United States and the European Union, took up arms
for Kurdish self-rule in southeastern Turkey.
Reuters |
Kani Yilmaz
Photo : Internet |
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