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Turkish Police arrests Kurdish suspect
over Diyarbakir bombing
8.1.2008
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January
8, 2008
DIYARBAKIR, Kurdish Southeastern region of
Turkey, -- Turkish police have detained a Kurdish
rebel in connection with a deadly
car bomb attack
last week that killed six people in the country's
main Kurdish city, officials and media reports said
Tuesday.
The Anatolia news agency, citing police sources,
identified the suspect as a member of the Turkey's
outlawed separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK)
who allegedly carried out the January 3 bombing in
Diyarbakir, the biggest city in Turkey's
Kurdish-majority southeast.
It said the man, who was detained in Diyarbakir, had
been trained in using explosives in rebel camps in
neighbouring northern Iraq where Ankara says
thousands of PKK militants enjoy a safe haven.
It did not name the suspect, said to be in his early
20s, or say when he was detained.
Speaking to reporters in Ankara, Erdogan confirmed
that police were holding a man over the bombing.
"A suspect has been caught, but I cannot say he is
the perpetrator, I do not have the authority,"
Erdogan told reporters in parliament.
The prime minister said the suspect had been
identified as the man who bought the car used in the
attack two days before the bombing.
Anatolia said several other suspects had also been
detained in Diyarbakir, but did not give a figure,
while the NTV news channel said police were holding
six other people.
Turkish officials were quick to blame the bombing on
the PKK. Since 1984 PKK
took up arms for self-rule in the country's mainly
Kurdish southeast of Turkey.www.ekurd.net
A
large Turkey's Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK for a
Kurdish homeland in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey.
The PKK did not claim responsibility, but said
Monday that its militants may have carried out the
attack "on their own initiative."
Five people -- four of them high school students --
were killed outright and nearly 70 were wounded when
an explosives-laden car was set off by remote
control Thursday near a military facility in
downtown Diyarbakir as an army vehicle carrying some
50 soldiers was passing by.
A sixth person -- also a student -- died of his
injuries early Tuesday, a hospital spokesman here
said.
Police said last week that the bomb consisted of 40
kilogrammes (88 pounds) of plastic explosives of a
type the PKK has frequently used.
The head of the Turkish armed forces, chief of
general staff Yasar Buyukanit, described the blast
as a sign of "panic" in PKK ranks following Turkish
air raids on the group's bases in the mountains of
neighbouring Kurdistan 'northern Iraq' last month.
The PKK, which has waged a bloody 23-year campaign
for Kurdish self-rule in southeast Turkey, had
threatened to retaliate against the air raids.
The PKK demanded Turkey's recognition of the Kurds'
identity in its constitution and of their language
as a native language along with Turkish in the
country's Kurdish areas,www.ekurd.net
the party also demanded
an end to ethnic discrimination in Turkish laws and
constitution against Kurds, granting them full
political freedoms.
The military has confirmed three air strikes
conducted with US intelligence assistance against
the PKK in Iraqi Kurdistan since December 16 in
which it said at least 150 militants were killed and
more than 200 PKK positions destroyed.
PKK rebels have been blamed for several recent bomb
attacks, including one in June near a bus stop in
central Diyarbakir that wounded seven people.
More than 37,000 people have been killed since the
PKK, listed as a "terrorist" group by Ankara, US and EU,
took up arms for Kurdish self-rule in the southeast
in 1984.
AFP
**
Kurds are not recognized as an official minority in
Turkey and are denied rights granted to other
minority groups. Under EU pressure, Turkey recently
granted Kurds limited rights for broadcasts and
education in the Kurdish language, but critics say
the measures do not go far enough.
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, a
large Turkey's Kurdish community 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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