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Kurdish mayor fined in Turkey for
pro-rebel gesture
28.2.2007 |
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February 28, 2007
ANKARA, February 27,-- A Kurdish mayor was
fined 3,000 lira (about 2,200 dollars, 1,650 euros)
Tuesday for allowing women to use an official
vehicle when they marked the birthday of jailed
Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan two years ago,
the Anatolia news agency reported.
The court convicted Zulkuf Karatekin, mayor of
Diyarbakir's Karapinar district, of allocating a
municipal vehicle to assist women members of
Turkey's main Kurdish Party, the Democratic Society
Party (DTP), who planted seedlings for Ocalan's
birthday on April 4, the agency said.
The judges first sentenced Karatekin, also a DTP
member, to six months in jail for "making illegal
donations to a political party" and immediately
converted the sentence to a fine.
Karatekin has the right to appeal.
Kurdish politicians in Turkey are routinely regarded
with suspicion and often seen as instruments of
Ocalan's Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has
been fighting an armed campaign against the Ankara
government since 1984.
The DTP was set up in November 2005, pledging to try
to resolve the Kurdish conflict through peaceful
means, but has so far made no progress.
It has come under fire for sympathising with the PKK,
which is blacklisted as a terror group by Turkey,
the European Union and the United States. Dozens of
DTP members face prosecution for supporting the
rebels.
AFP
** The use of the term "Kurdistan" is vigorously
rejected due to its alleged political implications
by the Republic of Turkey, which does not recognize
the existence of a "Turkish Kurdistan" Southeast
Turkey.
Others estimate as many as 40 million Kurds live in
Big Kurdistan (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Armenia),
which covers an area as big as France, about half of
all Kurds which estimate to 20 million live in
Turkey.
Turkey is home to some 20 million ethnic Kurds, some
of whom openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK for a
Kurdish homeland in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey
The Kurdish flag flown officially in Iraqi Kurdistan
but unofficially flown by Kurds in Armenia. The flag
is banned in Iran, Syria, and Turkey where flying it
is a criminal offence"
Southeastern Turkey:
North Kurdistan ( Kurdistan-Turkey)
wikipedia
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