13 killed as Kurdish rebels, Turkey soldiers clash

It was not clear if Turkish forces made an incursion into the Kurdistan Region in pursuit of PKK fighters, as they did last month.

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) - Clashes between the Turkish army and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) intensified on Thursday, with at least eight government troops and five Kurdish fighters killed on the border with the Kurdistan Region.

In a press release by the General Staff, the Turkish army said of those killed, six were soldiers, and two were state-paid Kurdish paramilitaries. There were also two soldiers wounded in the clashes.

PKK guerrillas based in the mountains of the Kurdistan Region were trying to cross into the Hakkari Province when the fight broke out, according to the statement.

There was no statement issued from the PKK's armed wing, the People's Defence Forces (HPG), regarding the ongoing clashes at the time of publishing this report.

The military launched a ground operation in the area supported by helicopters.

Hakkari, in the Turkey-Iraq-Iran border triangle, is a mountainous province where weather conditions are harsh and with low visibility due to fog.

It was not clear if Turkish forces made an incursion into the Kurdistan Region in pursuit of PKK fighters, as they did last month.

The area has seen fierce fighting since mid-2015 in the aftermath of the collapse of a two-years held ceasefire and peace talks between Ankara and the PKK leadership based in the Qandil Mountains which straddle the Iraq-Iran border.

With the swift emergence in recent years of Kurdish groups to prominence in the fight against the Islamic State (IS) group in Iraq and Syria, Turkey has opted for a more pro-active and offensive military strategy against the outlawed PKK, which seeks self-rule in some 20 Kurdish-majority provinces.

Urban clashes during 2015 and 2016 saw more than two thousand people killed from both sides, including hundreds of civilians according to a United Nations report released in January.

Editing by Nadia Riva