Police fired water cannon and tear gas to disperse around 2,000 people marching in Istanbul's Taksim Square on Saturday after a prominent Kurdish lawyer was shot dead in southeast Turkey, a Reuters witness said.
The killing of prominent Kurdish lawyer and rights activist Tahir Elci was described by pro-Kurdish HDP Party as “planned assassination”, and they urged people to take to the streets in protest.
Witnesses said Elci was shot in the head after making a statement to media in Diyarbakir, the largest city in Turkey's troubled, mainly Kurdish southeast, where he was president of the local bar association. A policeman was killed in the ensuing exchange of fire between attackers and plain-clothed police officers.
Hundreds of people have been killed since a ceasefire between the PKK and Turkish security forces collapsed in July, reigniting a conflict in which some 40,000 people have died since it began in 1984.