The blast in the town of Cizre in Sirnak province, which shares a border with both Iraq and Syria, took place at a police checkpoint, according to NTV news channel, Reuters reported.
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The blast in the town of Cizre comes two days after the Turkish military entered Syrian territory to launch an operation on the town of Jarabulus to oust the Islamic State militant group (ISIS) and to contain the territorial advances of Syrian Kurdish fighters who have captured swathes of territory from the ISIS on Turkey’s southern border. No group is yet to claim responsibility for the attack.
The attack caused huge damage to the headquarters of the special antiriot police with TV reports showing thick black smoke billowing from the spot, PTI said.
Violence between the PKK and the security forces resumed last year, after a fragile two-year peace process between the government and militant group collapsed. Hundreds of security forces members have been killed since.
Turkey has also seen a rise of deadly attacks that have been blamed on ISIS militants, including a suicide bombing at a Kurdish wedding in southeast Turkey last week that killed 54 people and an attack on Istanbul’s main airport in June, which killed 44.
According to the Sirnak governor’s office, three of those wounded in Friday’s attack were civilians.
In April, a human rights group in Turkey sent a report to the United Nations detailing serious human rights violations committed by the Turkish military during its campaign against the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party in the country’s southeast, as well as during curfews imposed in the region by Ankara.
The PKK is considered a terror organization by Turkey and its allies.
Over 40,000 people have been killed since the PKK first took up arms in 1984 with the aim of carving out an independent state for Turkey’s Kurdish minority.
Dogan News Agency reported that 8 police officers were killed and 50 people injured by the attack.
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On Thursday, Kurdish rebels opened fire at security forces protecting a convoy carrying Turkey’s main opposition party leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu in the northeast, killing a soldier and wounding two others, officials said.
