PKK protests Ocalan prison conditions

ANKARA, Turkey, Dec. 2 (UPI) -- Members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party demonstrated in southern Turkey in protest of the prison conditions for their leader, Abdullah Ocalan.

Ocalan is imprisoned at a detention facility on Imrali Island in the south of the Sea of Marmara. His living arrangements changed as justice officials developed plans to transfer more prisoners to the Imrali facility following the conclusion that Ocalan was suffering mentally from his solitary confinement.

Ocalan was held in isolation since his 1999 capture. His lawyers are now protesting the fact that his new cell is half the size of his old cell and he complains the quarters are harming his health, Turkey's leading English-language daily Today's Zaman reports.

The Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, in a written statement complained his cell was a "death hole" restricted in a way meant to kill the leader, the report added.

"The attitude displayed towards him is reason enough for war or peace," the statement read. "We are now at the end of words. From now on, we are not responsible for possible developments."

The conditions for Ocalan sparked protests in southern Turkey as PKK supporters took to the streets chanting pro-Kurdish slogans and vowing "revenge" against national security forces.

The unrest comes as Ankara struggles to find a political solution to its longstanding dispute with the Kurdish minority and separatist rebels.