Cemetery for PKK militants opened in Diyarbakır

DİYARBAKIR – Doğan News Agency

Around 5,000 people, including Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) members and around 15 PKK militants, who covered their faces with kaffiyeh, attended the opening of the cemetery where around 170 PKK militants are buried. DHA Photo

Thousands of people attended the opening ceremony of a cemetery for outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants in the southeastern district of Lice in a move followed by a public prosecutor’s investigation.

Around 5,000 people, including Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) members and around 15 PKK militants, who covered their faces with kaffiyeh, attended the opening of the cemetery where around 170 PKK militants are buried on July 14.

The Chief Public Prosecutor’s office in Diyarbakır opened an investigation about the cemetery opening, hours after the images of the event were emerged on the media, daily Hürriyet reported.

One PKK militant held a speech in Turkish at the 250-grave capacity cemetery opened in a rural area near the Yolçatı village of Lice.

Turkish police checked the IDs of those who were on a bus going to the cemetery when leaving Diyarbakır city limits. Turkish soldiers made another ID check on the road to Lice. A few kilometers later, a group of young people who covered their faces with kaffiyeh and introduced themselves as the security forces of the Kurdistan Communities Union (KCK), the so-called urban wing of the PKK, held ID checks on the road.

The group traveled around two kilometers to the cemetery in the rural Serkis area. Some BDP members held prayers near the cemetery.

BDP Diyarbakır deputy Nursel Aydoğan and provincial head Zübeyde Zümrüt as well as many other party members were present at the opening. Posters of some PKK members who died during clashes as well as a poster of Abdullah Öcalan, the convicted PKK leader imprisoned for life, were present. An unidentified PKK militant was buried, and the group observed a minute of silence while making victory signs. A PKK militant read the names and code names of the PKK militants buried at the cemetery, while the crowd replied “present” in Kurdish.

The group dispersed without any incident after the ceremony.