On Wednesday, the Turkish military said eight Kurdish militants had been killed in fighting in the southeast as security forces enforced curfews in several cities across the region, including parts of Diyarbakir, the de facto Kurdish capital.
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According to Turkish media, some 10,000 members of the police and army have been deployed in Cizre and Silopi in one of the biggest operations yet against the PKK, who have erected barricades and ditches inside the towns.
Security forces killed at least 23 PKK terrorists in ongoing anti-terror operations in Turkey’s southeastern Şırnak province within the last 48 hours, a security official told Anadolu Agency.
Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu pledged on Tuesday to prevent the PKK from “spreading the fire” from Syria and Iraq to Turkey by imposing checkpoints in towns, as the army has done in mountainous areas where militants were active in the past.
Police fired tear gas and water cannon at protesters at a march called by the main pro-Kurdish party, the HDP.
“Wherever there are sources of terrorism, we will definitely continue our fight until they are completely wiped out”, Mr. Davutoglu said in a speech in the Turkish capital of Ankara.
Military personnel and special operations forces will therefore provide support to counterterrorism police officers while additional police stations will be built in areas under curfew particularly those near the border with Syria.
Su announced a new curfew in Cizre and Silopi towns on Monday and many citizens have reportedly left the town before the curfew was imposed. Elsewhere in the city, militants threw handmade explosives under an armored police truck, triggering a brief confrontation between police and fleeing assailants. Two people were killed as police clashed with the crowds, a hospital official and witnesses said, as cited by Reuters.
On Monday (Tuesday NZT), two men were shot dead in Diyarbakir, while security forces have killed six militants in the province of Mardin since Friday.
Some 40,000 people have been killed in the three-decade conflict between Ankara and the PKK, which remains banned in the United States and Europe.
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Meanwhile, the International Crisis Group (ICG) said in a new report on Turkey that the urban battles have “given the conflict a new, unpredictable momentum”, and further urged Turkey and the PKK to return to the negotiating table.
