‘PKK attack’ kills one Turkish policeman, injures two others
At least one Turkish policeman has been killed and two others are injured in an attack blamed on members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in troubled southeastern Turkey.
Turkish military sources, speaking on condition of anonymity, said PKK militants, armed with long-barreled weapons and rockets, opened fire on security forces deployed to Mount Judi in Sirnak Province on Monday.
Who’s targeting who, and why
Turkey has been engaged in one of its biggest military operations in the southern border region in the recent past. The Turkish military has also been conducting offensives against the alleged positions of the Takfiri Daesh terrorists in northern Syria as well as those of the PKK in northern Iraq.
The operations began in the wake of a deadly July 20 bombing in the southern Turkish town of Suruc, an ethnically Kurdish town located close to border with Syria. Over 30 people died in the Suruc attack, which the Turkish government blamed on Daesh.
After the bombing in Suruc, the PKK militants, who accused the government in Ankara of supporting Daesh, engaged in a series of supposedly reprisal attacks against Turkish police and security forces, in turn prompting the Turkish military operations.
According to a tally conducted by Turkey’s state-run Anadolu news agency, a total of 145 Turkish soldiers and police officers have been killed since July 7 in armed attacks blamed on the PKK.
A long, intermittent fight for autonomy
The PKK has been fighting for an autonomous Kurdish region inside Turkey since the 1980s. The conflict has reportedly left tens of thousands of people dead.
On October 10, twin explosions targeted a number of activists who had convened outside Ankara’s main train station for a peace rally organized by leftist and pro-Kurdish opposition groups. The Turkish government says 97 died in the Ankara bombings; the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), however, puts the death toll at 128.
Following the attack, the PKK has called on its members to halt militant activities in Turkey in honor of the victims of the Ankara bombings unless they are threatened by an attack.
Previously, a shaky ceasefire had been reached between Ankara and the PKK, which collapsed with the launch of Turkish operations against Kurdish targets.
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