News / Turkey

Turkish army kills 8 PKK militants in Cizre, Silvan

Wednesday, 16 December 2015 5:26 PM [ Last Update: Wednesday, 16 December 2015 5:28 PM ]

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

The Turkish military says security forces have killed eight militants with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in an operation in the country’s volatile southeast.

In a statement issued on Wednesday, the army said the eight were killed on Tuesday during offensives in the towns of Cizre and Silvan after they opened fire on Turkish soldiers.

The security forces gave chase to the militants in the southeastern towns while being supported by helicopters and tanks.

Cizre and Silvan have witnessed blanket and open-ended curfews as the Turkish government is pushing ahead with its months-long campaign against the PKK.

Pro-Kurdish media, meanwhile, reported that an 11-year-old boy has been among those killed in the operation in Cizre.

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 the border with Syria. More than 30 people died in the Suruc attack, which the Turkish government blamed on 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 operations.

People in the Kurdish-majority towns and cities in the southeast are angry at the imposition of curfews that at times last for days as the security forces fight Kurdish militants.

Demonstrators cover their faces as they clash with police during a protest against the curfew in Sur district, the southeastern city of Diyarbakir, Turkey, December 14, 2015. (Reuters photo)

Three police officers were killed in a bombing in Diyarbakir on Tuesday blamed on the PKK. The blast came a day after two protesters were shot dead in violent clashes that broke out over a curfew in Sur, southeastern province of Diyarbakir, which has been in place since December 2.

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