Word: alevi
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Dates: during 1970-1979
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...incident that provoked last week's violence was a funeral procession for two left-wing Alevi teachers who had been gunned down by unknown assailants. A throng of 3,000 right-wing demonstrators blocked the procession's route. In the fighting that followed, three Sunnis were killed. Then the Sunnis began looting, burning and killing. Local R.P.P. deputies frantically cabled Premier Ecevit that "under an R.P.P government even our own people cannot be sure of protection in our headquarters...
...Sunni-Alevi split has been worsened by the left-right division of Turkish politics. In order to maintain his parliamentary majority, Ecevit has had to deal cautiously with extremist sentiment while carrying out a left-of-center program. Although the Premier was successful in ending the 3½-year-long U.S. arms embargo against Turkey, lifted last August, he also made some friendly overtures to the U.S.S.R. The gestures toward the Soviets have exacerbated feelings among extremist Ecevit opponents. One slogan shouted by Sunnis last week: COMMUNISTS TO MOSCOW...