Blast hits Turkish police vehicle in Kurdish-majority Diyarbakir

Four Turkish officers were killed and 14 others wounded after an explosion hit a police vehicle in south-eastern Turkish city of Diyarbakır on Thursday.

MENA

2 min read

The New Arab & agencies

31 March, 2016

Turkish forces are engaged in an operation against Kurdish rebels [Getty]

Four police officers were killed and 14 people wounded in a bomb attack targeting Turkish police in the Kurdish-majority southeastern city of Diyarbakir, hospital and security sources said.

The wounded included eight police, three of whom were seriously hurt, and six civilians.

Turkish forces are engaged in an operation against Kurdish rebels from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party [PKK] in the region.

The bomb exploded as a police armoured vehicle drove past, security sources said.

The attack came as prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu, whose government has waged a relentless campaign against PKK rebels since last summer, was due on Friday to make a rare visit to Diyarbakir.

Hundreds of security forces members have been killed since the PKK resumed its insurgency after a fragile truce collapsed last summer.

Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan said this week that 355 members of the security forces had been killed in the fighting, along with 5,359 members of the PKK.

It was not possible to confirm the toll on the rebel side.

Over 40,000 people have been killed since the PKK took up arms in 1984 demanding a homeland for Turkey's biggest minority.

Since then, the group has scaled back its demands to focus on cultural rights and a measure of autonomy.

A radical PKK offshoot, the Kurdistan Freedom Falcons [TAK], claimed responsibility for two suicide car bombings in Ankara this year that left dozens dead.