ANKARA, March 13: Turkey on Thursday banned the country’s main Kurdish party for anti-state activities and launched legal proceedings against a sister party, drawing a swift warning by the European Union that the crackdown could hurt Ankara’s membership bid.

The verdict against the People’s Democracy Party (HADEP) “will be studied by the organs of the EU, but it is certain to influence in a negative way Turkey’s European initiative”, said Greek foreign ministry spokesman Panos Beglitis, whose country chairs the EU presidency.

The constitutional court decision, reached unanimously by its 11-members, bans HADEP for links with separatist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) rebels, who have waged a 15-year armed campaign for self-rule in Turkey’s southeast.

“It has been understood that HADEP has become the focal point of activities against the state’s indivisible unity by aiding and supporting” the PKK, the court’s chief told a press conference at the end of a four-year trial.

The judges also slapped a five-year political ban on 46 party members and ordered the party’s assets to be seized.

Shortly afterwards, Turkey’s chief prosecutor Sabih Kanadoglu asked the court to ban the Democratic People’s Party (DEHAP), an offshoot of HADEP, founded in 1999 as a safeguard against the possible banning of the mother party.

Kanadoglu argued in his indictment that DEHAP had deceived Turkish officials on its overall national representation in order to be allowed to stand in the 1999 and 2002 elections.

“The said party has determinedly used deceit against law and has illegally obtained the right to run in polls,” according to the indictment carried by the Anatolia news agency.

The HADEP verdict came at a time of already strained ties between Turkey and the EU, which warned earlier this week that the failure to resolve the 29-year division of Cyprus would jeopardize Ankara’s efforts to become a member.

The closure of HADEP “is really adding to a trend of accumulating problems”, a European diplomat said. “I wonder what’s coming tomorrow.”

In a bid to align itself with European norms, Turkey last year amended its constitution to legalize one-time taboos, such as broadcasts and courses in the Kurdish language.

But Ankara remains deeply suspicious of the political aspirations of its sizable Kurdish community on account of the bloody fighting between the PKK and the army, which claimed some 36,500 lives, most of them Kurds.

HADEP leaders also condemned the verdict, which could raise tensions in mainly-Kurdish southeastern Turkey, where the Turkish army is readying for possible intervention against Kurdish rebels across the border in northern Iraq if the United States launches an invasion of Iraq.

“The decision will have a very negative impact on the Kurdish people. An optimistic atmosphere had begun to prevail with the EU membership process and they believed that the party would not be outlawed,” said Dogan Erbas, a senior HADEP member.

HADEP, which seeks to advance Kurdish rights through political means, has denied links with the PKK, but has frequently complained of what it called harassment by officials.

HADEP, the 24th party to be banned in Turkey since 1963, was set up in 1994 as a successor to another Kurdish party, the Democratic Party (DEP), which was also banned for links with the PKK.

Neither HADEP nor DEHAP have any parliamentary representation, but HADEP won control of several southeastern municipalities in elections in 1999.

Its election victory coincided with a return to calm in the southeast, after the PKK said in Sept 1999 it was laying down its arms, following the arrest of its leader, Abdullah Ocalan.

The atmosphere was further eased in November last year when Turkey lifted a 15-year state of emergency in the region. —AFP