Turkey Keeps Up Military Strikes on Kurdish Rebels, Kills 49 in Two Days

Turkey on Saturday kept up a major offensive against Kurdish rebels on its border and in northern Iraq on the third day of operations after rebel attacks killed 24 Turkish soldiers.

The military activity continued on both sides of the border, said an AFP photographer in the southeastern town of Cizre, less than 40 miles (70 kilometres) from the Iraqi frontier.

Local residents saw a convoy of 43 military trucks returning from the north of Iraq where members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) are holed up, he added.

The operation was continuing in Kazan valley in Hakkari province in the southeast, private NTV television reported.

Turkish helicopters dropped commando units and several Kurdish rebels were killed in clashes, it added.

Fifty-three rebels were killed since the operations began in the Kazan valley, the daily Hurriyet reported on its website, quoting unidentified sources as saying that the toll could increase.

More than 49 of the rebels were killed in two days during a major offensive in the country's mainly Kurdish south, the army announced on Saturday.

"A total of 49 terrorists were rendered ineffective over the last two days," said the General Staff in a statement posted on its website, adding that the operation was continuing.

PKK guerrillas last Wednesday killed 24 soldiers and wounded 18 in the mainly Kurdish southeast along the Iraqi border, the army's biggest losses since 1993.

The simultaneous attacks prompted the Turkish military to launch air and land operations against bases of the PKK, listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey and much of the international community.

Some 10,000 troops on the ground are involved in Turkey's operations, backed by jets and helicopters.

In a statement on its website on Friday, the military said the majority of the land and air operations are in Turkey, mainly in the Cukurca region -- the combat zone of the latest PKK attacks.

It did not specify how many troops, composed of commando units, gendarmerie and Special Forces, had entered Iraq.

Turkey is seeking support from its neighbors and Europe for its military campaign.

"The PKK is not only Turkey's enemy but also Europe's," Turkey's EU Affairs Minister Egemen Bagis was quoted as saying by the Anatolia news agency on Saturday.

"The security of Paris, Brussels, London begins from Sirnak, Hakkari" provinces in Turkey's southeast, said Bagis.

"We must fight against terrorism all together."

The attacks by Kurdish rebels have also mobilized Turkey's civil society.

Representatives of non-governmental organizations, business associations and professional chambers across Turkey are readying to meet with the president, prime minister and opposition party leaders, Turkish media reported.

Others in the southeast are expected to go to the Qandil Mountains in an attempt to convince the PKK to lay down arms, it added.

Clashes between the PKK and the army have escalated since the summer.

The PKK took up arms for Kurdish independence in southeastern Turkey in 1984, sparking a conflict that has claimed some 45,000 lives.

Turkey's last ground incursion into northern Iraq, an autonomous Kurdish region, was in February 2008, when the army struck against the Zap region.