Italian leaders across the political spectrum have supported his demands for political asylum, creating a vexing political problem for relations with NATO-ally Turkey. But on the pavement in front of the military hospital, he is a saint, his flower bedecked pictures icons. For many in the crowd, the yellow, green and red banners of the PKK also served as a inadequate blanket against the morning chill. The five-day vigil has been largely peaceful, though some Turkish journalists have accused the Kurds of roughing them up. We will stay here until Ocalan's political situation is cleared up.
Every Kurdish woman is like a bomb.
If they don't do what we want, if they don't release our leader, we are going to explode like a bomb. We are ready to die. People trying to get close to the demonstrators are frisked by members of a self-styled Kurdish security operation. Like many men and women in the crowd, Dogan, who would not give his last name, said he was willing to die for Ocalan. The possibility of losing his factory job in Switzerland was the last thing on his mind.