Watched by hundreds of riot police, a large convoy took the body from a mosque in Diyarbakir, the main city of the Kurdish-majority southeast, for burial in nearby Bismil, where the deadly violence took place Wednesday.

Shouting "Revenge, revenge!", masked youths paraded the coffin through Diyarbakir as mourners lined the streets, chanting slogans in favour of separatist Kurdish rebels fighting Ankara and waving their banners.

In Ankara, meanwhile, the Higher Electoral Board (YSK) began reviewing the appeals of seven Kurdish-backed candidates for the June 12 parliamentary elections, whose bids it had rejected Monday, setting the scene for violent Kurdish protests across the country.

The unrest has threatened to mar electioneering ahead of the polls and deepen Turkey's ethnic conflict, which has claimed some 45,000 lives since the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) took up arms against Ankara in 1984.

President Abdullah Gul appealed for calm Thursday, raising hope the disqualified candidates would be reinstated.

"Nothing can be resolved through violence," Anatolia news agency quoted Gul as saying.

"It turned out the documents (of the rejected applicants) were incomplete. Since they have been completed now, there should be no problem," he added.

In a signal that it will reverse its decision for at least some of the candidates, the YSK has asked them to present additional papers and a board member voiced hope Wednesday the review would be "in favour of democratic rights and fundamental freedoms."

The disqualification of their candidates deepened frustration among the Kurds at a time when their parties already face legal hurdles in the elections and many Kurdish activists remain in jail.

Among those barred is iconic Kurdish activist Leyla Zana, winner of the European Parliament's human rights award who has spent 10 years behind bars, and two members of the outgoing parliament.

They are backed by Turkey's main Kurdish party, the Peace and Democracy Party (BDP), but have applied as independents in order to circumvent an electoral threshold that requires parties to get at least 10 percent of the vote to enter parliament.

The death of the protestor in Bismil prompted BDP leader Selahattin Demirtas to cancel a meeting with Gul in Ankara Wednesday, which had been intended to promote dialogue.

An autopsy report, seen by AFP Thursday, said the man -- identified as 21-year-old Ibrahim Oruc by hospital officials -- was killed by a bullet that pierced his left arm and emerged through his chest.

There was no official word on who fired the fatal shot, but witnesses said police used first plastic bullets and then live rounds against the demonstrators.

The authorities said the police had responded to an "intensive" hail of petrol bombs, firecrackers and stones from the crowd, and announced a judicial investigation into the killing.

Street violence across Turkey since Tuesday saw protestors throw Molotov cocktails and stones at the police and public buildings, prompting the security forces to respond with tear gas and water cannons.

Enraged youths torched the Bismil office of the ruling Justice and Development Party Wednesday night, while a bus driver in Diyarbakir was critically injured when his vehicle caught fire from a petrol bomb.

Meanwhile, three PKK militants were killed and another arrested in fighting with the army in Kahramanmaras province, Anatolia reported.