By Xinhua
Ankara : Three members of the banned Kurdish Workers’ Party (PKK) surrendered to Turkish security forces in the southeastern province of Sirnak, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported on Sunday.
Three PKK members who escaped from their bases in northern Iraq turned themselves in to the security forces at Turkey’s Haburborder pass, said the report, quoting military sources, adding that the number of PKK members surrendered to the security forces within the last 30 days increased to 24.
On Jan. 17, ten PKK members had also escaped from their camps based in northern Iraq and surrendered to Turkish security forces in Sirnak, the Turkish General Staff said.
The Turkish military has recently launched several cross-border attacks to fight against PKK separatists, who use the Kurdish autonomous region in northern Iraq as a launch pad for attacks against Turkey.
The PKK, listed by the United States and Turkey as a terrorist group, took up arms against Turkey in 1984 with the aim of creating an ethnic homeland in the southeast. More than 30,000people have been killed in the over-two-decade conflict.