Three dead in Turkey as pro-Kurdish protests turn violent

Pro-Kurdish demonstrators incensed by Turkey's inaction in the fight against jihadists on the Syrian border clashed with police across the country today, leading to at least three deaths and leaving several wounded.
One young pro-Kurdish protester was killed in the southeastern city of Mus while police used tear gas and water cannon to disperse angry protests in Istanbul.
There were conflicting reports about how the 25-year-old protester was killed in the clashes in Mus, with the Hurriyet newspaper saying he died of a gunshot wound after being caught in crossfire.
But NTV television said he was killed after being struck in the head by a tear gas cannister fired by police to disperse the protesters.

In Diyarbakir, Turkey's largest Kurdish city in the southeast, two people were killed and 10 others were injured in the crossfire of a shootout between Islamist groups and demonstrators, an AFP reporter said.
Turkish Interior Minister Efkan Ala accused the pro-Kurdish protesters of "betraying their own country" and warned them to disperse or face "unpredictable" consequences.

"Violence will be met with violence... This irrational attitude should immediately be abandoned and (the protesters) should withdraw from the streets," Ala told reporters in Ankara.
Turkey's Justice and Development Party (AKP) government has so far not intervened militarily against Islamic State (IS) jihadists fighting for the Kurdish border town of Kobane, to the fury of Turkey's Kurds.

Turkey's main pro-Kurdish party, the People's Democratic Party (HDP), late last night called for street protests "against IS attacks and the AKP's stance on Kobane".
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has vowed that Turkey will do whatever necessary to prevent the fall of Kobane.
But Kurds bitterly accuse Ankara of merely looking on as the town risks being overrun by jihadists despite the dozens of Turkish tanks deployed on the border.
Almost all shops were closed in Mus, where where dozens of youths set fire to bins and lit smoke bombs and firecrackers. Another person was seriously injured.
In Istanbul's Gazi neighbourhood, largely populated by Kurds, police used tear gas and water cannon to disperse a protest by several hundred Kurds, an AFP correspondent reported.

Elsewhere in Istanbul, one person was seriously injured after being shot in the head from close range.