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Dozens injured, 300 Kurds detained in
Kurdish protests in Turkey
23.3.2008 |
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March 23, 2008
DIYARBAKIR, Kurdish Southeastern region of
Turkey, -- Dozens were injured and 300
detained Saturday as police used truncheons and tear
gas to break up violent Kurdish protests in several
Turkish cities, police and media reports said.
Three officials from the Kurdish Democratic Society
Party (DTP) were among those detained on charges of
provoking the unrest.
The disturbances erupted when celebrations marking
March 21, Newroz day, or the Kurdish New Year,www.ekurd.net
degenerated into
demonstrations in favour of the armed Turkey's
separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), listed as
a "terrorist" group by Ankara.
The worst clashes took place in the eastern city of
Van, where 132 people were rounded up and 53 others,
including 15 policemen, were injured, local police
chief Mehmet Salih Kesmez said.
DTP provincial chairman Abdurrahman Dogar and his
deputy Necmi Kalcik were among those detained, he
told Anatolia news agency, adding that the police
also raided the DTP office in Van and seized
"illegal" publications.
Three demonstrators and a policeman were in
intensive care after the clashes, he said.
Riot police used tear gas and water cannons to
disperse a crowd of some 1,500 Kurds, who chanted
slogans in favour of the PKK and its jailed Kurdish
leader Abdullah Ocalan,www.ekurd.net
set bonfires and
barricades in the streets and broke the windows of
shops and government buildings, media reports said.
Footage on the NTV news channel showed officers
hitting protestors with batons and armoured vehicles
spraying pressurised water on the crowd.
Young men, hiding their faces behind cloths wrapped
around their heads, were seen hurling stones at the
police, who took cover behind plastic shields.
Kesmez blamed the unrest on DTP organisers, who
defied a decision by Van authorities to allow Newroz
gatherings only on Friday.
Two DTP parliament members were also among the
crowd.
Another 93 people were rounded up in similar unrest
in Sanlurfa, Anatolia reported, adding that 16
protestors were detained in nearby Viransehir late
Friday after Molotov cocktails were hurled at the
police, injuring nine officers. |
Turkish riot police take cover behind an armoured
personnel carrier to protect themselves from petrol
bombs and stones hurled by Kurdish protesters during
clashes after the Newroz day celebrations in the
southeastern Turkish town of Viransehir March 21,
2008. Protesters clashed with security forces after
they celebrated Newroz in Viransehir on Friday.
Newroz, which means 'new day' in Kurdish, marks the
arrival of spring and is also celebrated in
Afghanistan, Azerbaijan, Iran and Tajikistan.
Turkish Kurds, some of them holding flags of the
outlawed PKK, and a poster of its jailed leader,
Ocalan, chant slogans during the Newroz celebrations
in the southeastern Kurdish city of Diyarbakir,
March 21, 2008 |
Sixteen people, among them three policemen, were
wounded and at least 17 protestors taken into
custody in Hakkari, near the Iraqi border, and in
nearby Siirt, the agency said.
Newroz festivities in other parts of the
Kurdish-majority southeast Friday and Saturday were
largely peaceful.
But unrest spread also to cities in western Turkey,
which are home to sizeable Kurdish migrant
communities.
Around 30 people were detained in Mersin, on the
Mediterranean coast, and in the Aegean city of Izmir,
where police also seized petrol bombs the suspects
allegedly planned to use in Newroz protests,
Anatolia said.
The DTP provincial chairman in Izmir, Mehmet
Bayraktar, was also detained after allegedly calling
for a "Newroz rebellion" and praising the PKK, it
said.
Newroz is a traditional platform for Turkey's Kurds
to demonstrate support for the PKK and demand
broader rights. About 50 people were killed during
Newroz clashes in 1992.
The PKK toop up arms for self-rule in the
Kurdish-majority southeast in 1984, sparking a
conflict that has claimed more than 37,000 lives. A
large Turkey's Kurdish community openly sympathise
with the Kurdish PKK rebels.
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, the party also demanded
an end to ethnic discrimination in Turkish laws and
constitution against Kurds, ranting them full
political freedoms.
This year's Newroz came in the wake of intensified
Turkish military action against the PKK, including a
week-long cross-border offensive against rebel
hideouts in neighbouring autonomous Kurdistan region
in 'northern Iraq' last month.
AFP | Agencies
** 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 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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