ANKARA, Dec 2 (AFP)  Turkey's Deputy Prime Minister Mesut Yilmaz on Saturday
 condemned as a "disgrace" a European Commission letter sent to a Kurdish rebel group that
 Ankara considers terrorists, the Anatolia news agency reported.

 A Commission spokesman has already disowned the letter, saying it had not been endorsed by
 Commission President Romano Prodi.

 But Yilmaz said: "We need to have more information on how binding this letter is to the EU. But,
 nonetheless, what has been done, whether with or without the knowledge of the commission, is
 a complete disgrace."

 Yilmaz was speaking from the southeastern town of Birecik, the agency reported.

 He was reacting to a letter, sent to both the leadership of the Kuridstan Workers Party (PKK)
 and a Kurdistan information centre, which stated that the rights of Kurds were not respected in
 Turkey, the spokesman said.

 The letter was sent on behalf of Prodi.

 But Commission spokesman Reijo Kemppinen described it as a "very regrettable mistake".

 Kemppinen, speaking from Brussels, said Prodi had had no knowledge of the letter, drafted and
 sent on November 20 by a Commission official with responsibility for relations with Turkey.

 In a statement late Friday, the Turkish foreign ministry denounced the letter as a plot aimed at
 damaging already-strained relations between Turkey and the European Union. Ankara
 demanded an investigation into those responsible.

 "It is beyond logic and reason that a terrorist organization responsible for the deaths of
 thousands of innocent citizens and aiming to divide Turkey, is seen as an interlocutor by the EU
 commission," the statement said.

 The deputy representative of the EU commission in Ankara, Luigi Narbone, was summoned to
 the ministry late Friday to hear Ankara's protests over the incident.

 Turkey categorically rejects any dialogue with the PKK, which launched an armed campaign in
 1984 for Kurdish self-rule in the country's mainly Kurdish-populated southeast and east.

 PKK attacks and counter-attacks by the Turkish army, which keeps a heavy presence in the
 region, have claimed some 36,500 lives, according to official figures.

 Following peace calls from its condemned leader Abdullah Ocalan, the group said in September
 1999 that it was halting its warfare against Ankara to seek a peaceful resolution to the conflict.
 But Turkey's army dismissed the announcement as "ploy".

 The row over the letter comes in the wake of recent tension between the EU and Turkey over
 what Ankara regards as EU attempts to attach conditions to its its progress towards
 membership of the European club.

 Turkey, a membership candidate since last December, has threatened to "revise" relations with
 the EU if it ties Ankara's accession to the resolution of the long-standing Cyprus conflict and
 territorial disputes with EU member Greece.

 The European Commission has condemned human rights violations in Turkey, but in November
 it also proposed a partnership arrangement with Ankara aimed at helping the country prepare for
 EU membership.

 EU foreign affairs ministers are due to discuss the partnership proposal at a meeting in Brussels
 on Monday.
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The Kurdistan Observer
www.kurdistanobserver.com

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