Turkey faces increased terror attacks by PKK as clamp down intensifies

The clashes between Turkey's security services and the outlawed Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) militants have intensified in the southeast of the country.

The causality due to fighting has also been on the rise with three Turkish soldiers killed and 24 others wounded late Thursday in a vehicle bombing attack against a gendarme station by the PKK militants in Diyarbakir province in the southeast.

Speaking in the central province Yozgat on Friday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said over 300 members of the security services were killed since July 2015 in the fight against the PKK.

However, he noted that the causality has been one to 10 against the PKK, suggesting that some 3,000 PKK militants were also killed in and outside of Turkey.

"Separatists and those who want to partition (Turkey) will not be able to succeed," Erdogan said.

Turkish military announced on Friday that a surgical strike by six F-16 and F-4 2020 Turkish fighter jets hit targets in Avasin and Basyan regions in northern Iraq on Thursday where the PKK commanders are based.

The military also said it killed 24 PKK militants in the sweeping security operations that took place in flashpoint city Sirnak and towns of Nusaybin and Yuksekova in the southeast.

Turkish analysts believe the lack of robust intelligence has paved the way for the high number of causalities on the part of security services.

Mehmet Ali Ozcelik, an intelligence expert with Ankara-based Research Center for Security Strategies (Gusam), said "law enforcement agencies must be able to stay one step ahead of terror groups."

"Intelligence capabilities must be shored up with better tactical and operational intelligence to remain effective against terror," he added.

On Friday, the PKK shelled Turkish military border division with anti-aircraft artillery fire in Semdinli town of southeastern province Hakkari near Iraq border.

No injuries were reported as Turkish troops returned fire with artillery shelling of PKK targets.

Bayram Kaya, security expert, said he believed the PKK exploited the peace process the government launched since 2012.

"While the PKK has never taken a step for a real withdrawal from the Turkish territories during the talks, the intelligence reports were prepared to falsely indicate that 90 percent of the PKK fighters left Turkey," he said.

Turkish opposition parties continued to criticize the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) government on Friday with the main opposition leader calling the government to resign over failures to stem terror attacks.

"There was an intelligence vulnerability but nobody (from the government) has resigned, people are loosing their lives but nobody is resigning," Kemal Kilicdaroglu, the chairman of the center-left Republican Poeples' Party (CHP) lamented.

"The people who govern this country are responsible," he said on Friday in Cubuk district in Turkish capital while visiting the family of a soldier who was killed in clashes with the PKK.

Speaking to his supporters in western city Manisa, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu described the surge in terror attacks as a plot to thwart Turkey's growth, disrupt security and stability.

He noted that terror groups will fail to achieve what they intended to do in Turkey.

Some analysts have suggested that Turkey must unite against terrorism as a whole and confront the threat together as opposed to increased polarization and divisions.

"It is not an exaggeration, nowhere is safe anymore," commentator Yusuf Kanli decried, calling everybody to join forces against the common threat of terror.

"The threat of terrorism is directed at all of us," he warned.

The PKK is listed as terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union.

It has been waging a separatist battle against Turkish state since 1984. More than 40,000 people have lost their lives during clashes.

In addition to the PKK threat, Turkey has also been threatened by a series of suicide terror attacks by the Islamic State (IS) militants. Endit