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Turkey: Hundreds of Kurds protest killing
of alleged PKK rebels
31.12.2011 |
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Photo: Getty
December
31, 2011
DIYARBAKIR, The Kurdish
region of Turkey, — Hundreds of Kurds on Saturday
protested against the
killing of two
Kurdish youngster allegedly were Kurdish rebels in
southeastern Turkey in a shootout with the police
who attacked their hideout.
The protestors demonstrated near where the two
suspected members of the banned Kurdistan Workers'
Party (PKK) died in a gun battle with the police
early Saturday in Diyarbakir city.
The crowd chanted slogans and threw stones at the
police, who responded with water cannon and tear gas
grenades and made several arrests.
Ten demonstrators were detained, according to
eyewitnesses.
One protestor was injured and immediately taken to
hospital, said an AFP reporter at the scene,www.ekurd.net
who was warned by police not to talk to the
demonstrators.
According to reports coming through two young people
have been killed by police in Diyarbakir, in the
Kayapınar area. Earlier independent reports said
that during a house raid by police a clash broke out
and two wounded people threw themselves or were
thrown out from the building, ANF News agency
reported.
It is now claimed by eyewitnesses that in fact the
two boys have been shot on the street by the police.
The governor of the city has told the press that two
people died as a result of an armed clash.
Eyewitnesses contradict this version of events and
claim that the two youngster have been shot on the
street and no clash was lived.
BDP, İHD (Human Rights Association), Mazkum-Der and
Diyarbakir lawyers are on the scene.
As circumstances of the death of two boys remain
uncleared, new witnesses say the boys were shot by
plain clothes policemen. Also people in the building
say police have taken all the mobile phones in the
building.
Tensions are running high in the region after a
botched Turkish air strike
killed 35 Kurdish civilians,
prompting the PKK to issue a call for an "uprising."
Turkey's military command said it carried out the
air strike after a spy drone spotted a group moving
toward its sensitive southeastern border under cover
of darkness late Wednesday, in an area known to be
used by militants.
But Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan admitted
Friday that the victims were smugglers and not
separatist rebels as the army had originally
claimed.
Since it was established in 1984, the PKK has been
fighting the Turkish state, which still denies the
constitutional existence of Kurds, to establish a
Kurdish state in the south east of the country, sparking a conflict that has claimed some 45,000
lives.
But now its aim is the creation an autonomous
Kurdish region
and more cultural rights for ethnic Kurds who
constitute the greatest minority in Turkey, numbering more than 20 million. A large Turkey's
Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK rebels.
PKK's demands included releasing PKK detainees,
lifting the ban on education in Kurdish, paving the
way for an autonomous democrat Kurdish system within
Turkey, reducing pressure on the detained PKK leader
Abdullah Öcalan, stopping military action against
the Kurdish party and recomposing the Turkish
constitution.
Turkey refuses to recognize its Kurdish population
as a distinct minority. It has allowed some cultural
rights such as limited broadcasts in the Kurdish
language and private Kurdish language courses with
the prodding of the European Union, but Kurdish
politicians say the measures fall short of their
expectations.
The PKK is considered as 'terrorist' organization by
Ankara, U.S., the PKK continues to be on the
blacklist list in EU despite court ruling which
overturned a decision
to place the Kurdish rebel group PKK and its
political wing on the European Union's terror list.
Copyright © 2011, respective author or news agency,
AFP | firatnews.com | ekurd.net | Agencies
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