News / Turkey

Bombing blamed on PKK kills 3 Turkish police

Tuesday, 15 December 2015 6:42 PM [ Last Update: Tuesday, 15 December 2015 6:42 PM ]

Demonstrators walk past an armored police vehicle during a protest against the curfew in Sur, Diyarbakir, Turkey, December 14, 2015. ©Reuters

Three Turkish policemen have been killed in a bomb attack blamed on the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants in the country’s troubled southeast, security sources say.

Unnamed security officials said the officers riding an armored vehicle hit a roadside bomb in the Silvan district of the province of Diyarbakir on Tuesday.

Three policemen were also injured.

The bombing came one day after two Turkish protesters died in clashes with police in the city of Diyarbakir amid growing anger over a curfew that has been in place in the Sur district over the past two weeks.

On Tuesday, thousands of mourners attended the funeral of the two demonstrators.

Mourners carry the coffins of two people killed in clashes with police during a funeral ceremony in the city of Diyarbakir, southeastern Turkey, December 15, 2015. ©Reuters

The curfew was declared on November 28 after Tahir Elci, a lawyer and advocate of Kurdish rights, was killed in Sur in a gun battle between police and unidentified gunmen while he was giving a press statement.

Ankara 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, located close to border with Syria. More than 30 people died in the Suruc attack, which the Turkish government blamed on the Takfiri Daesh terrorist group.

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

The PKK has been fighting for an autonomous Kurdish region inside Turkey since 1984. A shaky ceasefire between Ankara and the PKK that had stood since 2013 was declared null and void following the Turkish military campaign against the militant group.

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