DIYARBAKIR, Turkey - Four Turkish soldiers were killed in a landmine explosion Tuesday in the mainly Kurdish southeast of the country while two soldiers and two Kurdish rebels were killed in fighting, local officials said Tuesday.
The governor's office in Siirt province said four soldiers died when they stepped on a landmine believed to have been planted by militants of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) on Mount Gabar, near the border with the neighbouring province of Sirnak.
Two other soldiers were shot dead in a clash with PKK rebels also on Mount Gabar, they added.
Two PKK rebels were killed in a clash that erupted in Hakkari province, near the border with Iran, when they opened fire on troops who had ordered them to stop, officials said.
From 1984 to 1999, the PKK waged a bloody campaign for self-rule that claimed some 37,000 lives in the southeast of the country.
The group declared a unilateral ceasefire in 1999 after its leader Abdullah Ocalan was captured and tried in Turkey, and most of the rebels withdrew into neighbouring northern Iraq.
But they called off the truce last year, saying that reforms undertaken by the government to expand Kurdish freedoms were insufficient.
The Turkish army said last week that an increasing number of PKK militants were sneaking back into Turkey from Iraq to engage in anti-government violence, bringing along large amounts of explosives.
05/17/2005 12:57 GMT