Jailed Kurdish leader Ocalan complains of health problems, warns of clashes

ANKARA, Aug 10 (AFP) - Jailed Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan has said that weather conditions on the Turkish island where he is held are causing him serious health problems and has warned of clashes if "something happens" to him.

In a statement made available to AFP by his lawyers on Sunday, Ocalan urged the Council of Europe to send an inspection mission to the Imrali island prison in the Marmara Sea, where he is the sole inmate.

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"They should monitor me here for 24 hours and establish how long I can continue to live here," said the 55-year-old leader of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), who is serving a life term for treason and separatism.

"If something happens to me here, there could be fresh tensions and clashes which I will be unable to prevent even though I do not desire them," he said.

Ocalan said that because of intensive humidity in Imrali, he was suffering from chronic angina, which also gave him a throat infection and was sometimes leaving him breathless and was interrupting his sleep.

Ocalan has been in Imrali since 1999 when he was sentenced to death for leading the PKK's 15-year armed struggle for Kurdish self-rule in southeast Turkey, which has claimed some 36,500 lives.

His sentence was subsequently suspended and last year commuted to life in prsion after Turkey abolished capital punishment.

Council of Europe officials, who have visited Ocalan several times, have found his jail conditions satisfactory, but have urged Ankara to take steps to ease his isolation.

A special team of doctors has been assigned to look after Ocalan since he was imprisoned there.

Ocalan's complaints come at a time when he and other PKK leaders have rejected an amnesty plan by the Turkish government, which aims to encourage the rebels to lay down their arms but excludes the leadership of the group from its scope.

In a statement released Friday, the PKK warned it could end its unilateral ceasefire, declared following Ocalan's capture in 1999.

The group has already carried out several attacks in recent weeks, including an ambush of a government convoy which left two soldiers dead and a bomb attack on a security checkpoint in which two policemen were killed.

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