By Xinhua,
Ankara : A Turkish soldier and two militants of the banned Kurdish Worker’s Party (PKK) were killed in their clashes on Monday, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported on Tuesday.
A group of PKK militants opened fire on a Turkish gendarmery team in Karakocan town of eastern province of Elazig, leaving one Turkish soldier dead.
In a separate operation launched by the Turkish security forcesin Dicle town of the southeastern province of Diyarbakir, two PKK militants were killed.
Meanwhile, Turkey’s General Staff said in a statement it posted on its web-site that a PKK member surrendered to the Turkish security forces in Yuksekova town of the southeastern province of Hakkari.
The PKK, listed by the United States and Turkey as a terrorist group, took up arms in 1984 with the aim of creating an ethnic homeland in southeastern Turkey. About 40,000 people have been killed in the over-two-decade conflict.
Turkey has conducted frequent air raids on suspected positions of the PKK in northern Iraq, which serve as a launch pad for the rebel group’s cross-border attacks on Turkey.