30 PKK rebels killed in military operations in Turkey
Xinhua, February 5, 2016 Adjust font size:
A total of 30 rebels of the outlawed Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) were killed in the military operations staged by the Turkish security forces in southeastern Turkey on Thursday, said a military statement on Friday.
The Turkish security forces killed 11 PKK militants in Cizre town of Sirnak province, seven PKK militants in Sur town of Diyarbakir province and 12 PKK members in Hakkari province in the military operations in southeastern Turkey, said the statement released by the Turkish Armed Forces.
A total of 701 PKK militants were "neutralized" in the towns of Cizre and Sur since early December, the statement added.
The PKK negotiated a cease-fire with the government in 2013, but the truce fell apart in the wake of a suicide bomb attack in the border town of Suruc in Sanliurfa Province last July which killed 34 pro-Kurdish and left-wing activists.
Turkey's southeast has seen the worst violence in two decades since a two-and-a-half-year cease-fire between the government and the PKK collapsed in July of last year, reviving a conflict that has killed 40,000 people since 1984.
The PKK is listed as a terrorist group by Turkey, the U.S. and the European Union. Endit