DIYARBAKIR - Anti-terror police were Thursday questioning a suspected member of an outlawed Kurdish rebel group arrested as she allegedly prepared to bomb government buildings in this mainly Kurdish city in southeastern Turkey, security soruces said.
The 27-year-old woman was detained late Wednesday near police headquarters in Diyarbakir and was found in possession of 1.5 kilograms (3.3 pounds) of C-4 plastic explosives and a detonator that could be set off by a mobile telephone, the sources said.
She is believed to be a member of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which waged a bloody campaign in the region between 1984 and 1999.
The PKK proclaimed a unilateral ceasefire in 1999 after its leader Abdullah Ocalan was captured and tried, but it called off the truce last year, raising tensions in the region.
Since then, a radical Kurdish group calling itself the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons has claimed responsibility for August 2004 bomb attacks against two Istanbul hotels, which killed two and injured 20, mostly tourists.
The group, which Turkish police says is an offshoot of the PKK, recently said it was also behind a parcel bomb explosion in a Turkish seaside resort in which one policeman was killed and four other people were injured.
05/05/2005 10:42 GMT