In Turkey, 23 charged over links with PKK

Sat, 26 Dec 2009

Twenty-three officials, including eight mayors, have been charged by a Turkish court over having ties with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

According to a judicial source on Saturday, the court in Diyarbakir, the administrative capital of Turkey's Kurdish-dominated southeast, charged the suspects overnight.

The officials are among 31 people who were arrested in a Thursday operation which was carried out in 11 provinces against the PKK and its off-shoots in urban centers.

So far, over 100 people have been charged in the investigation, which was headed by the chief prosecutor's office in Diyarbakir.

The mayors involved were members of the now-defunct Democratic Society Party (DTP), which was banned by Turkey's top court two weeks ago on grounds that it has links with the PKK.

After the ban, the former DTP members joined a recently founded Kurdish political party, called the Peace and Democracy Party.

The PKK is blacklisted as a terrorist organization by much of the international community, including Turkey, Iran, the US and the European Union.

Source: PressTV.
Link: http://www.presstv.ir/detail.aspx?id=114686§ionid=351020204.