Seventy offices and other workplaces were damaged, and one bank in the southeastern, mainly Kurdish, city of Diyarbakir was completely burned down, security officials said.

Several arrests were made before police brought the violence under control at around 10.30 p.m. (1930 GMT), but no figures were available.

The clashes started at funeral ceremonies for 14 members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) killed last weekend by security forces during a military operation in the region.

In Diyarbakir, the largest city in Turkey's southeast, youths hurled Molotov cocktails and stones at armoured personnel carriers. Police, many of them wielding riot shields, used teargas and truncheons against the protesters.

The demonstrators, waving PKK flags and pictures of jailed rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan, also broke windows of nearby offices and shops.

More police and troops were drafted into Diyarbakir from nearby towns to help restore order, security officials said.

Police and protesters also clashed during a funeral ceremony in the city of Adana near the Mediterranean coast.

Ankara blames the PKK for the deaths of more than 30,000 people since the group launched its armed struggle for an independent Kurdish homeland in southeast Turkey in 1984.

The PKK is also classed as a terrorist organisation by the European Union and the United States. An estimated 5,000 rebels are holed up in the mountains of mainly Kurdish northern Iraq.