Four Turkish soldiers fall in roadside blast in Van
Four Turkish soldiers were killed Tuesday in a bomb attack ripping through a military convoy in the Kurdish-dominated southeastern region, security sources say.
The same number of troops were also injured in the roadside blast in Van Province.
The sources blamed members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militant group for the attack.
On May 18, a bomb attack on military vehicles in the town of Semdinli in Hakkari Province killed four soldiers and wounded nine others.
The Turkish military has launched large-scale military operations against the PKK militants in its southern border region since last summer. The government has imposed curfew in the areas that have been targeted in the army’s anti-PKK campaign.
The Turkish military has also been pounding the PKK positions in northern Iraq.
The operations began in the wake of a deadly July 2015 bombing in the southern town of Suruc. More than 30 people died in the attack, which the Turkish government blamed on the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group.
After the bombing, the PKK militants, who accuse the government in Ankara of supporting Daesh, engaged in a series of reprisal attacks against Turkish police and security forces, prompting the Turkish military operations.
Hundreds of members of the Turkish security forces have been killed in attacks over the past months. However, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has vowed no let-up in the ongoing operations.
A shaky ceasefire between Ankara and the PKK that had stood since 2013 was declared null and void by the militants following the Turkish strikes against the group.
The PKK has been fighting for an autonomous Kurdish region in southeastern Turkey since 1984. The conflict has left thousands of people dead.
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