News / Turkey

Dozen killed in clashes between Turkey army, PKK

Thursday, 19 November 2015 5:47 AM [ Last Update: Thursday, 19 November 2015 5:48 AM ]

A masked police officer walks as armored police vehicles block a road leading to the site of armed clashes with Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants in Diyarbakir, southeastern Turkey, October 26, 2015. (Photo by AP)

At least a dozen people, including two civilians, have been killed in fresh clashes between Turkish security forces and members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Turkey’s southeastern province of Mardin.

In a statement released on Wednesday, the provincial governor’s office said 10 PKK militants were slain during an exchange of gunfire in the city of Nusaybin, situated 792 kilometers (492 miles) east of the capital, Ankara.

The statement added that two civilians also lost their lives in the shootout, while 13 others sustained injuries.

The development came only two days after a civilian was killed and four others injured in clashes between Turkish police and PKK militants in the same Turkish city.

Armed militants from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) stand behind a barricade during clashes with Turkish forces in the Bismil district of Diyarbakir Province, Turkey, September 28, 2015. (Photo by AFP)

Turkey has been engaged in a large-scale military campaign against the PKK in its southern border region in the recent past. The Turkish military has also been conducting offensives against the positions of the PKK in northern Iraq.

The operations began in the wake of a deadly July 20 bombing in the southern Turkish town of Suruc, an ethnically Kurdish town located close to border with Syria. Over 30 people died in the Suruc attack, which the Turkish government blamed on Takfiri Daesh terrorists.

After the bombing in Suruc, the PKK militants, who accuse the government in Ankara of supporting Daesh, engaged in a series of supposedly reprisal attacks against Turkish police and security forces, in turn prompting the Turkish military operations.

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