At least eight Turkish soldiers have been killed and 16 wounded in an ambush by Kurdish rebels.
The attack took place in Yuksekova, near the border with Iraq and Iran. Ground troops and combat helicopters are pursuing the assailants, according to state TV.

Several thousand Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) rebels are believed to be based in hideouts in northern Iraq.

Tens of thousands of people have died since the PKK took up arms in 1984.

Security sources told Reuters that the rebels had crossed the border to carry out the attack on an army post, and had then retreated back to Iraq.

Clashes between the PKK and the Turkish armed forces have increased in south-eastern Turkey over the past year, and the PKK has in the past carried out bombings in other parts of the country.

A powerful bomb in Ankara in September last year killed three people and wounded 15.

Hard line

The BBC's Jonathan Head in Istanbul said the attack near Yuksekova followed the same pattern as other recent operations by the PKK.

The rebels launched their assault on the isolated military base at night. The Turkish authorities say 10 insurgents were killed in the fighting.

The government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has taken an increasingly hard line towards the PKK, BBC correspondent says.

Thousands of Kurdish civilians believed to support the movement have been arrested, and the army has been authorized to pursue and engage insurgents.

The government acknowledges that the conflict cannot be solved through military means, although negotiations have made little headway, BBC correspondent adds.

Kurdish minorities constitute up to a fifth of Turkey's population and also live in Iraq, Iran and Syria.

The PKK, which is classified as a terrorist organization by the EU and the US, launched a guerrilla campaign in 1984 for an ethnic homeland in the Kurdish heartland in the south-east of Turkey.

It has now dropped a claim for an independent Kurdish state but says it is fighting for autonomy and the cultural rights of the Kurdish people.

PHOTO CAPTION

File photo of a Turkish army convoy on a road near the Turkish-Iraqi border in southeastern Turkey.

BBC