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Turkey: Six Kurdish rebels killed in May clashes:
army
15.5.2007 |
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May
15, 2007
ANKARA, -- Turkish security forces have
killed six Kurdish rebels in clashes with the
separatists since the beginning of the month, the
army said Monday.
The statement posted on the army's Internet website
said the six were members of the outlawed Kurdistan
Workers' Party (PKK) -- considered a terrorist group
by Turkey, the United States and the European Union
-- and were killed between May 1 and 11, but did not
specify where the clashes took place.
The army also said 14 rebels had been arrested and
another seven had surrendered.
Turkish media in the past few days has reported a
surge in the army's operations in the southeast of
the country where there is a majority Kurdish
population.
The PKK announced a unilateral ceasefire last
October but Turkish authorities rejected it.
More than 37,000 people have been killed since the
Kurdish PKK started its fight for independence from
Ankara in 1984.
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 over 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 over 25 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.
Before August 2002, the Turkish government placed
severe restrictions on the use of Kurdish language,
prohibiting the language in education and broadcast
media.
The Kurdish alphabet is still not recognized
in Turkey, and use of the Kurdish letters X, W, Q
which do not exist in the Turkish
alphabet has led to judicial persecution in 2000 and
2003
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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