News / Turkey

33 PKK militants killed in Turkish army airstrike, clashes with police

Friday, 21 October 2016 1:12 PM [ Last Update: Saturday, 22 October 2016 3:34 AM ]

Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants are seen during a gunfight with Turkish security forces in Turkey’s southeastern city of Nusaybin in this photo dated February 25, 2016. (Photo by AP)

Nearly three dozen members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militant group have been killed after Turkish military aircraft and security forces conducted separate counter-terrorism operations against the militants in the country’s southeastern provinces of Hakkari and Diyarbakir.

The Turkish General Staff said in a statement that an unmanned aerial vehicle targeted a PKK hideout on Dilekli Nizar Mountain in the Yuksekova district of Hakari Province, located 1,026 kilometers east of the capital Ankara, on Friday morning. Six PKK members were killed in the assault.

The development came only a day after Turkish Air Force fighter jets launched an aerial attack against PKK positions in the Cukurca district of the same province, leaving 26 Kurdish fighters dead.

Also on Thursday, a PKK terrorist was killed in clashes with security forces in the Lice district of Diyarbakir Province.

Separately, security personnel destroyed a vehicle rigged with three tons of explosives in the Savur district of the Kurdish-dominated southeastern province of Mardin.

Turkish soldiers carry a picture and the coffin of Tolga Aktas, a soldier who was killed during clashes with Kurdish PKK militants in the country’s southeastern province of Hakkari, at Kocatepe Mosque in the capital Ankara on September 6, 2016. (Photo by AFP)

A shaky ceasefire between the PKK and the Turkish government collapsed in July 2015, and attacks on Turkish security forces have soared ever since.

Over the past few months, Turkish ground and air forces have been carrying out operations against PKK positions in the country’s troubled southeastern border region as well as Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region and northern Syria.

The campaign was launched after more than 30 civilians lost their lives in a July 2015 bomb attack in the southern Turkish town of Suruc. Turkish authorities held the Takfiri Daesh terrorist group accountable for the act of terror.

PKK militants, who accuse the Ankara government of sponsoring Daesh, mounted a series of reprisal attacks against Turkish security forces after the bombing, prompting the Turkish military operations.

The PKK, which has been calling for an autonomous Kurdish region since 1984, has since carried out several attacks on police and military posts in the largely Kurdish region.

Press TV’s website can also be accessed at the following alternate addresses:

www.presstv.co.uk