News / Turkey

Bomb attack kills three soldiers in southeast Turkey

Monday, 21 March 2016 12:39 PM [ Last Update: Monday, 21 March 2016 12:37 PM ]

Turkish soldiers prepare themselves for military action during a curfew in the Kurdish city of Diyarbakir on February 26, 2016. (AFP photo)

At least three Turkish soldiers have been killed in a bomb explosion that ripped through their armored vehicle in the country’s restive southeastern Mardin Province, security sources say

Local security officials said on Monday that the incident took place in the southeastern town of Nusaybin near the border with conflict-stricken Syria as the convoy was passing through the volatile region.

No individual or group has yet claimed responsibility for the latest deadly attack, but members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) have been behind numerous similar attacks throughout the troubled region.

Security across Turkey has become fragile as a result of the country’s direct confrontation with Kurds inside and outside of the country.

Over the past months, Turkish military has been conducting offensives against PKK positions in the country’s largely Kurdish southern regions.

Militants of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) stand behind a barricade during clashes with Turkish forces in the Bismil district of Diyarbakir Province, Turkey, on September 28, 2015. © AFP

Turkish armed forces have expanded their war well beyond the country’s borders, chasing PKK forces into northern parts of Iraq, while shelling Kurdish parts of Syria as well.

The Ankara government has also been at loggerheads with Kurdish fighters of the People’s Protection Units (YPG) and the Democratic Union Party (PYD) based in Syria, billing them as PKK allies.

The operations began in the wake of a deadly July 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.

The bombing prompted the PKK fighters, who accuse the government in Ankara of supporting Daesh, to react by attacking police and security forces.

The attacks against the PKK voided a shaky ceasefire declared in 2013 between the government and the militants, who have been fighting for an autonomous Kurdish region inside Turkey since 1980s.

The Human Rights Foundation of Turkey recently estimated that 162 civilians have been killed in the restive regions placed under a government-imposed curfew since August 2015.

The Ankara government does not recognize the PKK and considers it a terrorist group, with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan likening it to the Daesh Takfiri terrorists who are wreaking havoc in some parts of Syria and Iraq.

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