Led by Kurdish MPs, the crowd flocked to Eruh town, where members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) attacked army facilities on August 15, 1984, killing one soldier and marking the start of a violent self-rule drive.

Some carried portraits of jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan and brandished banners glorifying the rebel chieftain as songs praising the PKK blared from loudspeakers.

"We support the roadmap for peace," one banner read, referring to a "roadmap for a democratic solution" that Ocalan is expected to announce soon.

Speaking at the gathering, organised as a culture festival, Kurdish lawmaker Osman Ozcelik cautioned Ankara that peace efforts would fail if Ocalan and the PKK were overlooked.

"One cannot resolve the problem without the leader of the Kurds," he said.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's government has said it is working on a fresh reform package aimed at expanding Kurdish freedoms and eroding popular support for the rebels.

Ankara rejects dialogue with the PKK, which it lists as a terrorist group, but Kurdish activists insist the PKK should be part of the settlement.

A rebel commander urged Kurdish youths Saturday to join the PKK ranks, saying Ankara's reform pledges should not be taken for granted, in remarks carried by the pro-PKK Firat news agency.

"Young people should know their place is in the mountains, in the field of action... They should be at the forefront, with the defence forces," Nurettin Sofi said.

He stressed the PKK would heed Ocalan's peace proposals and welcomed a nationwide debate on how the conflict should be resolved, but warned that "we should take precautions not to fall in a trap," Firat reported.

Ocalan, serving a life sentence since 1999, was expected to unveil his "roadmap" Saturday, but his lawyers said he had not yet completed the plan.

Ankara, for its part, has remained tight-lipped on the content of the reform plan, while struggling to win the support of civic groups and a hostile opposition, which argues that broader Kurdish freedoms will threaten Turkey's unity.

Erdogan vowed Saturday the government would not be discouraged by the objections.

"Some people say it will not be possible for us to take these steps. But we have made a decision... We must overcome this problem," he said in Istanbul.

Eager to boost its EU bid, Turkey in recent years granted the Kurds a series of cultural freedoms, including the inauguration of a public Kurdish-language television in January.

But Ankara has failed to draw up a clear strategy to bring down the rebels from their mountainous bases in Turkey and neighbouring northern Iraq, rejecting also suggestions to grant them a general amnesty.

The conflict, which saw its bloodiest period in the 1990s, has claimed about 45,000 lives and led to human rights violations on both sides, causing mass migration from rural to urban areas and badly damaging the already meagre economy of the impoverished southeast.