The attack took place at a funeral in the central Anatolian city of Kayseri for a soldier killed in a Kurdish rebel ambush that saw mourners denounce the government's reform plan, the NTV news channel said.

As the mourners were dispersing, the assailant hit the mininster, shouting "This is a punch from the Turkish nation", before he was overpowered by bodyguards, the report said.

Yildiz was treated at the local hospital for a cut on his nose after the punch broke his glasses, his spokesman told AFP, denying reports that the mininster's nose was broken.

In August, the Turkish government announced that it would expand Kurdish freedoms in return for securing an end to a 25-year armed rebellion by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

So far, it has only announced steps to lift some restrictions on the Kurdish language and stampt out human rights abuses -- measures criticized by Kurdish activists as insufficient.

The initiative has since faltered amid a series of unsettling events, including the banning of Turkey's main Kurdish political party in December and a series of bloody PKK attacks that have led to public outrage at the government.

More than 45,000 people were killed since 1984 when the PKK, blacklisted by Ankara and much of the international community, picked up arms for self-rule in Turkey's Kurdish-majority southeast.