The Democratic Society Party (DTP) held a convention here to elect a new leader amid tight security and against a backdrop of Turkish threats to strike Kurdish rebel bases in northern Iraq, a move the party strongly opposes.

"We should work for reconciliation and social peace within the country instead of directing our energy and resources across the border," Nurettin Demirtas told the gathering, hours before he was elected party chairman.

The DTP, which holds 20 seats in the 550-member parliament, advocates a peaceful settlement to the Kurdish conflict and broader cultural and political rights for the Kurdish community.

But its refusal to brand the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) a terrorist group, as Ankara does, and the sympathy its members often voice for the rebels have sparked accusations that it is a political tool of the PKK.

The party came under fresh attack after three of its lawmakers travelled to northern Iraq on Sunday to participate in the release of eight Turkish soldiers captured by the PKK in a deadly ambush last month.

Television footage showed them shaking hands with rebel fighters and signing papers on a table adorned by the portrait of jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan.

Demirtas said DTP efforts for reconcilitaion had encountered "an attitude of incredible intolerance and lynching" in Ankara.

Justice Minister Mehmet Ali Sahin, saying "public opinion believes they (the DTP) have links" with the PKK, issued a veiled warning the party might be banned if it fails to dissociate itself from the rebel group.

"If they insist on serving PKK objectives on a political basis... whatever Turkey's constitution and legislation require will be done and they will have to bear the consequences," Sahin told Samanyolu television overnight.

The DTP was created in 2005 as a successor to several Kurdish parties outlawed by the courts.

New chairman Demirtas is a little-known figure who many expect to have a less moderate approach to the Kurdish question than the outgoing Ahmet Turk.

Kurdish activists have called for an amnesty for PKK militants to persuade them to lay down their arms but Ankara has dismissed the appeal.

Turkey, under EU pressure, has in recent years granted the Kurds a measure of cultural freedoms but Kurdish activists say the reforms are inadequate.

Analysts, however, say the reforms have helped diminish Kurdish militancy.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's Justice and Development Party posed an unprecedented challenge to the DTP in its stronghold in the mainly Kurdish southeast in the July 22 elections.

Erdogan says 75 of his party's 340 members of parliament are Kurds.

The United States is staunchly opposed to a major Turkish military incursion into northern Iraq but has promised to help crack down on PKK bases there.

A pro-PKK news agency reported Thursday fears of an imminent Turkish air strike on some bases in the wake of an increasing number of fly-over sorties by US surveillance planes.

"It is believed that an air strike is imminent," said the Firat news agency. "It is reported that the PKK is increasing its counter-measures and will respond strongly in case of an attack."

After talks with Erdogan Monday, US President George W. Bush pledged to provide Ankara with "real-time" intelligence on rebel movements, calling the PKK a common enemy.