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Police officer killed in PKK attack in eastern Turkey

Xinhua, September 1, 2015 Adjust font size:

A police officer was killed in an ambush by the rebels of the banned Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) in Igdir province of eastern Turkey on Tuesday, private Dogan news agency reported.

Police officer Olgun Kurbanoglu walked toward a military post in the Karakoyunlu town of Igdir Tuesday morning after a child informed him of "two suspects" in the area, according to the report.

The PKK militants, hiding in the fields, opened fire at Kurbanoglu in the head and chest with automatic rifles, the report said, adding that Kurbanoglu died in hospital.

Meanwhile, a group of PKK militants attacked a police car with automatic rifles at Dolum Street in Batman city in southeastern Turkey on Tuesday afternoon, leaving two police officers wounded, Dogan news agency reported.

Tensions escalated in both eastern and southeastern Turkey amid the Turkish military's ongoing cross-border bombing campaign against PKK hideouts in northern Iraq.

The operations were followed by several attacks against Turkish security forces by the PKK inside Turkey, killing over 60 soldiers and police officers.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union, took up arms in 1984 in an attempt to create an ethnic homeland in southeastern Turkey. More than 40,000 people have since been killed in conflicts involving the group. Endit