Turk police in nationwide crackdown on Kurd party

[ozgurluk at xs4all.nl]

Turk police in nationwide crackdown on Kurd party 
09:49 a.m. Nov 18, 1998 Eastern 

ISTANBUL, Nov 18 (Reuters) - Turkey's main legal Kurdish party said on
Wednesday hundreds of its members had been detained in a nationwide
police crackdown as public tension grew over the fate of arrested Kurd
rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan.

``There are efforts to create Kurd-Turk hatred, but we call on
everyone to act with responsibility and refrain from acts that would
incite enmity,'' People's Democracy Party (HADEP) board member Mehmet
Satan told a news conference.

Five busloads of riot policemen were stationed outside the party
building in an upmarket Istanbul shopping district as he
spoke. Elsewhere, far-right nationalists have staged protests in front
of HADEP buildings.

Italian police arrested Ocalan, the leader of the Kurdistan Workers
Party (PKK), last week on arrival at a Rome airport. Initial Turkish
elation at his arrest has turned to anger amid signs that Rome might
not extradite him to Turkey.

The mainstream Turkish press has fuelled the public's sense of
outrage, in part by targeting HADEP and the Human Rights Association,
both of which advocate a peaceful solution to the guerrilla conflict
in southeastern Turkey.

More than 500 people have been detained in police raids on HADEP
offices in Istanbul, the southern town of Mersin, and the towns of
Malatya, Kars, Diyarbakir and Elazig in eastern Turkey, party
officials told Reuters.

Turkey holds Ocalan and his PKK responsible for the deaths of more
than 29,000 people in 14 years of conflict in southeastern Turkey
where the PKK seeks self rule.

Anatolian news agency said Turks and 50 HADEP supporters swapped
punches in a busy shopping district in Izmir, western Turkey, on
Tuesday night.

A court in Ankara on Tuesday sentenced HADEP leader Murat Bozlak to a
year in jail for speeches made in 1993. Bozlak and 14 other members of
a now-banned predecessor party were found to have spread ``separatist
propaganda'' in various publications and speeches.

-- 
Press Agency Ozgurluk
For justice, democracy and human rights in Turkey and Kurdistan!
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