(AFP) ANKARA, Turkey — Six Turkish security forces were killed on Friday after an attack by Kurdish militants in the southeastern province of Siirt in Turkey, local officials said.
Three other village guards and four soldiers were wounded while they were providing safety during road construction, the Siirt governor’s office said in a statement.
Those killed were also village guards — locals employed to combat Kurdish militants.
The governorate did not give further details on the attack but blamed the “separatist terrorist organization” — Turkey’s official term for the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
The office said that a wide operation was underway to “neutralize the PKK terrorists who launched the attack.”
The PKK has been waging an insurgency in the southeast since 1984 and is proscribed as a terror organization by Ankara and its Western allies.
Fighting in the region intensified between Turkish security forces and the PKK after the collapse of a two-year ceasefire in 2015.