Operations against PKK militants in SE Turkey kill 17

It shares borders with Syria and hosts more Syrian refugees than any other nation in the world and is therefore an important player in efforts to find solution to the Syrian crisis too.

A few who may have changed their vote recalled that, after the HDP's supposedly game-changing triumph, there was a wave of attacks on its offices by nationalists seething over violence carried out by the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), a group outlawed in Turkey.

Speaking on the issue, pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) Co-chair Selahattin Demirtaş said: "I don't see anything to change our [HDP] stance on the issue of the presidential system", referring to the HDP's slogan before the June 7 parliamentary election where the AK Party temporarily lost its 13-year single party majority.

Erdogan has said the peace process, which Ankara launched with jailed PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan in late 2012, has been consigned to the "refrigerator".

Along with autonomy, Kurds want formal education in the once-banned Kurdish language as well as recognition of their ethnic identity as a minority in a new constitution.

In his first major speech since the AKP's win, the president on Wednesday vowed to continue operations against the group, which Turkey - along with the United States and the European Union - deems a terrorist group. A 20-year-old man was shot dead in the town of Silvan, where authorities ordered a round-the-clock curfew in three neighbourhoods for a second successive day.

Daesh is believed to have been behind the Ankara bombing that killed 102 people. Technically, the AKP is no longer Mr. Erdogan's party, as the presidency is supposed to be politically neutral, but it is no secret that he is counting on a strong AKP to concentrate power in his presidency now that he can no longer be prime minister. More than 40 000 people, mainly Kurdish militants, have died in the prolonged conflict. That would cement his status as Turkey's most dominant leader in decades, yet he may need Kurdish votes in parliament or a referendum to get the measure through. "If the HDP [a leftist party with its roots in the Kurdish freedom movement] hadn't gained enough votes to enter the parliament, the AKP would have been very powerful".

Ibrahim Kalin, a presidential spokesman, told Al Jazeera that Erdogan plans to push for a "completely new constitution", something he has spoken about in the past. "You can't have red lines".

With the election over, however, there is hope that the new government will restart the negotiations.

It's an often-heard theory here in the predominantly Kurdish regions of eastern Turkey.

He even backed Islamic State when it attacked the territory that had been liberated by the Kurds of northern Syria. Turkey's army fired on them when they tried to cross the Euphrates River and expand westwards, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said last week. During the recent months, many lives have been lost in a string of terrorist attacks.

At the same time, it is clear that Turkey is really under the gun in its region right now, which may have been the principal reason for voters to strengthen Mr. Erdogan's mandate in spite of concerns over his anti-democratic tendencies. "The government must show it is honest about seeking peace in order to restart the process".