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Turkey replaces pro-Kurdish mayors with state officials in southeast


FILE - People chant slogans during a protest against the arrest and removal from office of a mayor from Turkey's main opposition party for alleged links to a banned Kurdish militant group, in Istanbul, Turkey, Oct. 31, 2024.
FILE - People chant slogans during a protest against the arrest and removal from office of a mayor from Turkey's main opposition party for alleged links to a banned Kurdish militant group, in Istanbul, Turkey, Oct. 31, 2024.

Turkey stripped three elected pro-Kurdish mayors of their posts in southeastern cities on Monday, for convictions and charges on terrorism-related offenses, the interior ministry said, appointing state officials in their places instead.

Local governors replaced the mayors in the provincial centers of Mardin and Batman, while the mayor of Halfeti in Sanliurfa province was also unseated, it said.

All belonged to the pro-Kurdish DEM Party, which has 57 seats in the national parliament. Dozens of pro-Kurdish mayors from its predecessor parties have been removed from their posts on similar charges in the past.

Last week, a mayor from the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) was arrested after prosecutors accused him of belonging to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), banned as a terrorist group in Turkey.

The changes followed a proposal by President Tayyip's Erdogan main ally last month aimed at ending the state's 40-year conflict with the PKK.

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    Reuters

    Reuters is a news agency founded in 1851 and owned by the Thomson Reuters Corporation based in Toronto, Canada. One of the world's largest wire services, it provides financial news as well as international coverage in over 16 languages to more than 1000 newspapers and 750 broadcasters around the globe.

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