Turkey | One Turkish soldier killed, eight wounded in southeast

Smoke rises and fires still burn after Kurdish militants attacked a police checkpoint in Cizre on Friday

One Turkish soldier was killed and eight others wounded in two separate blasts yesterday in the country’s Kurdish-dominated southeast, and Kurdish militants launched a rocket-propelled grenade at a civilian airport, officials and the state-run news agency said.
The Anadolu Agency said one soldier was killed and three were wounded after a roadside bomb was triggered remotely by rebels linked to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, in the Hakkari province. In another attack, five civilian village guards were wounded in Siirt province after their van hit an improvised explosive device on a road, the news agency said, blaming PKK for the blast.
Yesterday, Kurdish rebels, apparently targeting a police checkpoint at Diyarbakir Airport, fired a grenade that exploded near the airport’s VIP passenger entrance, shattering windows, the local governor’s office said. No injuries were reported. Passengers were taken to safety after the attack and flights resumed after a brief pause during the police investigation.
Violence between the PKK and the security forces resumed last year, after the collapse of a two-year peace process in July. Since then, more than 600 Turkish security personnel and thousands of PKK militants have been killed, according to Anadolu. Rights groups say hundreds of civilians have also been killed in the clashes.
On Friday, a Kurdish suicide bomber rammed an explosives-laden truck into a checkpoint near a police station in the southeast, killing at least 11 Turkish police officers and wounding 78 other people.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was visiting southeastern city of Gaziantep yesterday to express condolences for last weekend’s suicide bombing there at a Kurdish wedding that left 54 dead.
Turkey has sent tanks across the Syrian border following weeks of deadly attacks by the PKK and the Islamic State group. The move aims to both fight IS and halt the advance of Syrian Kurdish groups. Dusan Stojanovic, Istanbul, AP