Lice (pronounced [ˈlidʒe]), (Kurdish: Licê, Ottoman Turkish: ليجه,) is a municipality and district of Diyarbakır Province, Turkey. Its area is 982 km, and its population is 24,364 (2022). It is located 90 km (56 mi) from the capital, Diyarbakır. Its population is Kurdish. In the local elections in March 2019 Tarık Mercan from the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) was elected mayor. The current District Governor is Muhammed Evlice.

History

Lice was the headquarters of the 5th Army Corps of the Turkish army during the Sheikh Said rebellion in 1925 and it was a focal point at the beginning of the rebellion. The town was captured on the 20 February by the troops loyal to Sheikh Said. The Kurdish Zirki tribe in the Lice district also supported the Sheik Said rebellion and as a reprisal, the tribes villages Çaylarbaşı, Kurlu, Alataş, Mat-bur and Çağlayan have been demolished and the residing population was killed by troops of the Turkish army. It was reported that the troops of the Turkish Major Ali Haydar have wiped out the majority of the Sheikhs.

On 6 September 1975, Lice was struck by an earthquake with a magnitude of M_s 6.7. Around 1.500 people were killed in Lice according to the mayor.

The Kurdistan Workers' Party or PKK, was founded in the village of Fîs, in Lice district on November 27, 1978.

The Lice massacre, during which the Turkish army demolished large parts of the town in reprisal of the death of an Jandarma officer, took place from October 20–23, 1993.

Between 2018 and 2019 localities in the Lice district have often been targeted with curfews declared by the Turkish authorities, which wanted to execute security operations in the district.

The Kurdish castle of Ataq used to exist near the modern Lice.

Demographics

In 1914, 5,980 Armenians and 4,100 Assyro-Chaldeans lived in the kaza. Armenians had 24 churches, one monastery and five schools. Lice proper had 12,000 inhabitants, including 7,000 Christians (Armenians, Chaldean, Syriac Orthodox). During the Armenian genocide, all males were massacred, women and children were deported and their fate is unknown.

Composition

There are 70 neighbourhoods in Lice District: