Turkish police fire tear gas on Istanbul protest against southeast operations

Meanwhile hundreds of people seeking to march from the main provincial centre of Sirnak to Silopi and Cizre were blocked by police who used tear gas, pro-Kurdish media said.

The escalating violence has dashed hopes for the resumption of peace talks between the state and PKK, which have fought a three-decade conflict that has killed more than 30,000.

At least two soldiers and five civilians have also been killed in the fighting, the source said.

Thousands of protesters marched in the city Diyarbakir Tuesday against the curfew imposed on the Sur neighborhood. Imposing open-ended, round-the-clock curfews in entire neighbourhoods or towns until further notice represents a massive restriction of some of the most fundamental human rights of a huge population.

The PKK launched a formal insurgency against the Turkish state in 1984, initially fighting for Kurdish independence although it now presses more for greater autonomy and rights for the country’s largest ethnic minority.

Traditionally foccused on the countryside, the PKK has shifted to southeastern towns, setting up barricades and digging trenches to keep security forces away.

Demirtas accused the government and military of targeting citizens who were presented as “terrorists”. Erdogan and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu suggested there would be no let-up in the campaign.

The Turkish government criticized the visit following the falling out between Ankara and Moscow over the downing of a Russian jet last month on the Syria border.

Both towns and several other areas in the mainly Kurdish south are subject to a curfew order restricting movement by civilians.

Food and water was running scarce in some Diyarbakir districts, while shopkeepers kept shutters closed in protest at operations, residents said.

“Due to the curfew our members and their families cannot leave their house and move to safer place and therefore have become targets for bullets”, a party statement said.

Witnesses in Cizre and Silvan told Human Rights Watch that when people tried to get an ambulance for injured people, the emergency services told them it was not possible for an ambulance to come and that police blocked them when they tried to take wounded victims to hospitals by auto.

It said a Turkish soldier was killed along with two PKK fighters in an operation in the village of Olek in Bitlis province on Tuesday.