Turkey: Gendarmerie attacked in Agri, 3 militants killed

The PKK claimed responsibility for Monday’s bombing of the police station in which four people died, three of them attackers.

The U.S. State Department said the PKK should renounce violence and engage Turkey in talks.

The party has been fighting for greater autonomy for the Kurdish minority in south-eastern Turkey since 1984, a conflict that has killed tens of thousands of people.

Istanbul police took into custody Tuesday three suspects in relation to the attack.

The authorities have targeted suspected DHKP-C, IS and PKK members in a succession of “anti-terror” raids in the last two weeks.

The Revolutionary People’s Liberation Front (DHKP-C) said on its website that one of its female militants carried out Monday’s attack, which left no reported casualties.

The latest air raids followed a day of violence in which nine people were killed, including five police offers in separate attacks in Istanbul and in southeastern Sirnak province, which the government blamed on the PKK.

By largely focussing on the PKK – both in neighbouring Iraq and at home – Ankara has raised suspicions among Kurds that its real agenda is to check Kurdish territorial ambitions rather than to crush the hardline Islamists. “They have a sociological base in Turkey and without a political process that will tackle the Kurdish problem, Erdogan may attack or damage the PKK but will never destroy it”.

There were no immediate claims of responsibility and it was not known if the attack on the police was connected to the Consulate assault.

The European Union and US, which like Turkey list the PKK as a terror group, have backed Ankara’s right to strike against the militants but also indicated concern about the scale of the campaign.

The group carrying out daily attacks in Turkey on the security forces, in an escalating cycle of violence as the military bombs rebel targets inside Turkey and northern Iraq.

Police wearing flak jackets and holding machine guns blocked off streets leading to the consulate.

A military helicopter in the same province also came under attack, killing at least one gendarme private, Turkey’s military said, according to the news agency. “Turkey is protecting IS”, he said. The government considers the PKK a terrorist organization just like the Islamic State, as do various Western countries.

10, 2015, the U.S. Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey announced its closure to the public following a security incident involving two gunmen that morning. “Whatever their goal is, for us, a terrorist organisation is a terrorist organisation”.