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 Intense fighting continued in the Syrian Kurdish border town of
Kobani, where a more than three-week-old assault by Islamic State
fighters has infuriated Turkey's 15 million strong Kurdish minority,
which wants Ankara to intervene militarily.
Automatic gunfire echoed across the border but a Kurdish military
official said the advance by Islamic State militants on the town had
been slowed by ongoing U.S.-led coalition airstrikes.
The unrest in Turkey over the fate of Kobani risks stirring up
deep-running ethnic divisions there and wrecking a delicately poised
peace process aimed at disarming fighters from the outlawed
Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), who have been fighting a 30-year-old
insurgency against the Turkish authorities demanding more autonomy.
At least 25 people were killed earlier in the week as violence
erupted during pro-Kobani demonstrations in towns and cities across
the country.
A police chief and a policeman were seriously injured and two
officers killed on Thursday after unidentified gunmen opened fire
with automatic weapons as they inspected shops damaged during
troubles earlier in the week in the eastern province of Bingol,
according to Dogan News Agency.
Four of the alleged attackers were later killed and two more were
caught following a shootout with security forces, the agency
reported.
No details of the attackers were available early on Friday and no
one claimed responsibility for the reported assassination attempt,
the first of its kind since a senior police officer was gunned down
in Diyabakir in 2001.
"Terrorists responsible for this (attack), were punished within one
or two hours, all necessary measures taken," Prime Minister Ahmet
Davutoglu told reporters in Ankara on Friday, without giving further
details.
GUNS AND SWORDS
The southeastern border province of Gaziantep saw some of the worst
violence overnight, when four people were killed and 20 were wounded
as armed clashes broke out between protesters demonstrating in
solidarity with Kobani and groups opposing them.
Footage showed crowds of mostly men armed with guns, swords and
sticks roaming the street of Gaziantep, and two local branches of
the Kurdish People's Democratic Party (HDP) in Gaziantep were set on
fire, Dogan News Agency reported.
Police officers were also targeted in attacks in the southeastern
province of Siirt, the southern province of Mersin and the eastern
Tunceli province, local media reported, whilst government buildings
including police headquarters came under attack.
The fledgling Kurdish peace process championed by Turkish President
Tayyip Erdogan has helped smooth over some of the bitterness created
by the three decade insurgency which left an estimated 40,000 people
dead, but recent clashes risk re-opening old wounds.
Kurdish anger over Kobani has also revived long-standing grudges
between sympathizers of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and
Turkey's Hizbullah, a radical Islamist group with strong anti-PKK
leanings.
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Speaking on Wednesday, Davutoglu warned against jeopardizing efforts
to find a lasting peace.
"Where there is no public order, there won't be a peace process,
there will be nothing," he said during a speech in Ankara, in
reference to the unrest earlier in the week.
KOBANI FIGHTING
The refusal of Turkey - which has NATO's second biggest army - to
intervene militarily to halt Islamic State's advance toward Kobani
has put it under increasing pressure both from Kurdish groups but
also Ankara's western allies.
Turkish officials insist they will not be sucked into unilateral
action embroiling them in Syria's bitter civil war, which has
already driven more than 1.2 million people across the border, a
refugee flood that Turkey has struggled to cope with.
On Friday intense gunfire between Islamic State fighters and
outgunned Kurdish forces in the streets of Kobani could be heard
from across the border.
Jets roared overhead and the western edge of town was hit by an
airstrike apparently carried out by U.S.-led coalition warplanes
which have intensified their campaign against IS targets around
Kobani in recent days.
The head of the Kurdish forces defending Kobani said Islamic State
was in control of roughly a third of the town. Intensified coalition
air strikes were helping to check the group's advance, Kurdish
military officials said.
The Islamists have been gradually tightening their stranglehold on
Kobani for more than three weeks, using heavy artillery to pound
residential areas and sending an estimated 200,000 people, mostly
Syrian Kurds, fleeing across the border.
Kurdish officials have called for Ankara to allow weapons and
fighters to flow into Kobani from Turkey, but Turkish officials are
reluctant to help the town's defenders, because they have strong
links with the PKK, still viewed as a terrorist organization in
Turkey, the U.S. and Europe.
(Reporting by Seda Sezer in Istanbul and Tom Perry in Beirut,
writing by Jonny Hogg, editing by Philippa Fletcher)
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