A highly charged Turkish First Division clash between Diyarbakirspor and Bursaspor was called off by the referee on Saturday following crowd trouble in this mainly Kurdish southeastern city, an selfnews correspondent said. The referee suspended the game in the 17th minute, when it was 0-0, after supporters of the home team Diyarbakirspor threw objects on to the pitch, injuring one of the linesmen. When subsequent announcements failed to end the unruly behaviour of fans, the game was called off and the match officials and the away team left the stadium under police escort. Bursaspor fans had already been barred from the game to prevent violence. The unrest spilled outside the stadium where fans threw stones at police who responded with tear gas and water cannons. The violence left another five people injured, among them a journalist. There has been bad blood between the two clubs since a match in the first half of the season in September at the Bursaspor ground during which home supporters accused Diyarbakirspor of links to armed Kurdish rebels waging a 25-year separatist campaign against Turkey. The match, which Bursaspor won 4-0, saw rival fans dismantling plastic seats and throwing them to each other, leaving 10 people injured. The September violence came at a time when the government was lobbying for planned measures to improve the rights of its Kurdish community with the hope of securing an end to the rebel campaign. Stadium violence is not rare in football-mad Turkey, and bloody incidents between rival fans, notably during derby matches, are frequent. 