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Kurdish unrest erupts in Turkey after DTP ban

ISTANBUL - Daily News with wires | 12/12/2009 12:00:00 AM |

Hundreds of Kurds chanting "revenge" took to the streets Friday and continued unrests on Saturday after Turkey's top court banned the country's main Kurdish party for links to the PKK

Hundreds of Kurds chanting "revenge" took to the streets Friday and continued unrests on Saturday after Turkey's top court banned the country's main Kurdish party for links to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK.

Riot police used tear gas and water cannons against a crowd of some 1,000 people who gathered outside the offices of the Democratic Society Party, or DTP, in the southeatern city of Diyarbakır, after the court announced its ruling in Ankara.

Turkey’s Constitutional Court outlawed the DTP because of links to the PKK, which is listed as a terrorist group by Ankara and most of the international community.

"Blood for blood! Revenge!" the crowd shouted, chanting also slogans praising jailed PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan, reported Agence France-Presse.

Some protestors hurled petrol bombs at the police and targeted them with slings, also smashing the security cameras of nearby banks.

A crowd of about 100 protestors also gathered at the DTP office in Istanbul, Turkey's largest city which is home to a sizeable Kurdish migrant community, displaying a banner that read "An End to the Attacks on the Kurdish People."

"We are all Kurds, we all belong to the DTP," chanted the crowd.

Some two dozens youths threw stones at riot police, who responded by firing a single gas bomb.

Unrests continued to flare Saturday and the renewed tensions over DTP's closure are expected to further undermine a government initiative announced in August to expand Kurdish freedoms in a bid to erode popular support for the PKK.

According to Anatolia news agency, a crowd of nearly 3,000 gathered in front of the DTP office in Hakkari. When the angry crowd pelted security forces with stones, the police used tear gas and water cannons. The crowd continued demonstrations and lit up small fires as barricades in the streets. A young child was injured when demonstators passed through a street, reported Anatolia news agency.

In Yüksekova, protestors burnt tyres in the streets, while a police chief was injured by people throwing stones in Van, Anatolia reported.

The reform drive already faltered last week when one person was killed in violent Kurdish protests in the southeast over claims that Öcalan's prison conditions have deteriorated. The PKK responded by killing seven soldiers in an ambush in Tokat on Monday.

The ruling is perceived to have a negative impact on government efforts to mend fences with the restive Kurdish community.

Turkey's main Kurdish party met Saturday to decide a course of action. Leader of the outlawed DTP, Ahmet Türk, condemned his party's closure as "a blow to our faith in peace," but voiced hope that "despite all obstacles, peace will definitely prevail in this country."

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