DIYARBAKIR, Turkey, Nov 13 (AFP) - 12h07 - More than 10,000 people gathered Sunday in the southeastern Turkish city of Diyarbakir to call for a peaceful solution to the region's Kurdish rebellion.

The "democracy and peace" demonstration, organised by local non-governmental groups and pro-Kurdish independence parties, took place amid tight security in the predominantly Kurdish city.

The area around 600 kilometres (375 miles) further east, near Turkey's borders with Iran and Iraq, remained tense on Sunday following a bomb blast and clashes in recent days that has left two dead and dozens injured.

Protestors in Diyarbakir chanted slogans for the outlawed pro-independence Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), and its leader Abdullah Ocalan, jailed for life by a Turkish court in 1999.

Southeastern Turkey has been the scene of a bloody Kurdish rebellion for self-rule which has claimed around 37,000 lives since 1984.

Unrest has increased considerably this year after the PKK, blacklisted as a terrorist group by Turkey, the European Union and the United States, called off a five-year unilateral ceasefire in June 2004.