ANKARA
Turkey's pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) urged Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to accelerate the solution process to address the issues of minorities, particularly those of the Kurdish minority.
"Do you want those children who crossed the border to return to their families? The most important thing you need to do is to accelerate the peace process, to remove lawlessness and all inequalities," Ertugrul Kurkcu, co-chairman of HDP, said Tuesday in the party's parliamentary group meeting.
Kurkcu's statement came after the terrorist organization PKK reportedly kidnapped an unknown number of children on April 23, threatening to destabilize a delicate 'solution process' to end terrorism and address the issues of minorities, particularly those of the Kurdish minority which is by far the largest accounting for 18 percent of the population.
Previously, PM Erdogan called on the pro-Kurdish opposition parties to find and bring back the teenagers, accusing the parties of affiliation with PKK.
Kurkcu criticized Erdogan, saying "We are not working as an institution that enlists children into military service or finds them."
www.aa.com.tr/en
