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One dead, 10 injured in fresh SE Turkey
clashes
1.4.2006
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DIYARBAKIR,
Kurdistan-Turkey, April 1, 14:31:51 GMT (Reuters) -
Fresh clashes between Kurdish protesters and police
in southeast Turkey killed one protester and injured
10 others on Saturday, security sources said.
The latest death brought the toll in this week's
violence to eight dead. The protester was named as
Ahmet Arac.
The clashes erupted near the Syrian border in the
town of Kiziltepe, a town of around 100,000 people
south of the mainly Kurdish region's largest city
Diyarbakir, where most of this week's violence has
been focused.
Demonstrators set fire to a branch of a major bank
and a building used by the ruling Justice and
Development Party (AKP).
"We are very sad about what happened to this man in
the prime of his life," Cihan Sincar, the mayor of
Kiziltepe, told Reuters by telephone when asked
about the death.
"Our wish is that this trouble should come to an
end," she said, adding that Arac, who was about 24
years old, was shot in the head during protests in
the town centre in the morning. It was unclear who
shot him, she said.
FUNERAL CEREMONIES
Riots erupted on Tuesday after funeral ceremonies
for 14 members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers
Party (PKK) killed last weekend by security forces.
Ankara regards the PKK as a terrorist group
responsible for the deaths of more than 30,000
people since it launched its armed campaign for an
ethnic homeland in southeast Turkey in 1984. But
many Kurds view the PKK sympathetically.
Police and protesters also clashed in the town of
Silopi, near the Iraqi border on Saturday.
Demonstrators threw stones and sticks at the police
who responded by firing tear gas.
A three-year-old boy died of gunshot wounds on
Friday in Diyarbakir and local media said he was
killed after police fired shots over the heads of
protesters.
Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said children were
being used as "pawns of terrorism" in unrest
gripping the region and warned that security forces
could not guarantee their safety.
Diyarbakir, a city of around one million people, was
calm on Saturday and shopkeepers opened their stores
after keeping them shut at the height of the
trouble.
The European Union, which Turkey aims to join, has
expressed concern about the violence and urged
Ankara to do more to combat poverty in the southeast
and to boost Kurds' cultural rights.
Reuters
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