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03/13/2006:

"Kurdish conference opens in Turkey under tight security"

ISTANBUL (AFP) - Turkish and Kurdish intellectuals have gathered under tight security for a major conference to discuss a peaceful resolution to the 22-year-old Kurdish conflict in the country's southeast.

Police imposed strict security measures after nationalists threatened to disrupt the two-day event, designed to promote ways of ending a conflict that has long impeded Turkey's efforts to join the European Union.

Officers searched participants at the entrance of the venue Saturday, the private Bilgi University, and several dozen riot police were on guard outside the campus.

More than 45 Turkish and Kurdish intellectuals, politicians and journalists of various political convictions were taking part in the conference, entitled "The Kurdish question in Turkey: ways for a democratic settlement".

Organizers said the conference could adopt a final declaration on Sunday, appealing to the government for more reforms to resolve the conflict, which has claimed some 37,000 lives since the rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) began fighting for self-rule in the mainly Kurdish southeast in 1984.

The conflict has led to allegations of gross human rights violations on both sides, ravaged the already meager economy of the region and forced hundreds of thousands of already poor peasants to migrate into urban slum areas.
news.yahoo.com