ISTANBUL,—The leader of Turkey’s main pro-Kurdish party on Tuesday accused Ankara of committing a “massacre” following reports that scores of civilians had been killed in a military operation against Kurdish rebels in a flashpoint town in Turkish Kurdistan.

Cizre in southeastern Turkey has been under a punishing curfew for six weeks as the army pursues a relentless campaign against rebels of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

The government says it is fighting “terrorists” in Cizre, and denies claims that civilians have been targeted.

According to Turkish television reports, security forces on Sunday raided a building in Cizre, killing up to 60 wounded people who had been sheltering there for more than a week.

“They committed a massacre in Cizre, and they don’t want to announce it,” Selahattin Demirtas, leader of the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), told party lawmakers.

Then on Tuesday a 17-year-old Kurdish teenager was killed in the city of Diyarbakir during clashes that broke out after 3,000 people gathered to demonstrate against the military operations in Cizre, security sources told AFP.

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu on Monday dismissed claims that civilians had been targeted in Cizre, saying the state was only fighting “terrorists” and was “doing its best to cause no civilian casualties.”

Interior Minister Efkan Ala on Tuesday branded the reports of civilian deaths “disinformation”, and said: “Nothing is being hidden, the place in question does not even exist.”

He was apparently referring to the largely ruined building in the Cudi district of Cizre, where according to Kurdish lawmakers dozens of wounded Kurds were trapped and killed.

“We are conducting these operations in the framework of democratic rules,” the minister said, adding that the military campaign in Cizre was drawing to a close.

The army said on Monday a total of 10 Kurdish rebels were killed in Cizre, bringing the total number of militants killed in the town to some 575 since the “anti-terror” operation started in December.

It was not immediately possible to independently verify the figures.

Turkish police on Monday fired tear gas and water cannon to break up a protest in Istanbul against military operations in the Kurdish town of Cizre.

A new upsurge of violence between the security forces and Kurdish rebels erupted in July, shattering a fragile two-and-a-half year truce.

The PKK initially took up arms in 1984 against the Turkish state, which still denies the constitutional existence of Kurds, to push for greater autonomy for the Kurdish minority in Turkish Kurdistan who make up around 22.5 million of the country’s 78-million population. The conflict has left tens of thousands dead. A large Turkey’s Kurdish community openly sympathise with PKK rebels.

Copyright ©, respective author or news agency, AFP | Ekurd.net

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