Turkish army captain killed in PKK attack

An army captain was killed when militants of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) attacked a military outpost in southeastern Turkey late Aug. 21.

PKK militants targeted a gendarmerie outpost in the Beytü??ebap district of the ??rnak province at 9.30 p.m. Captain Ali Alkan and two more soldiers were wounded in the clash that continued for an hour, Turkish media reports said.

Captain Alkan died at the ??rnak Military Hospital at 2.00 a.m. on Aug. 22, as the army launched an operation to find the perpetrators who fled the area after the attack.

Before Alkan's death, 55 Turkish security personnel were killed in terrorist attacks across Turkey over the past month, while the security forces have killed 771 militants from the PKK in operations within the country and in northern Iraq, according to official figures.

Turkey has been struck by an upsurge in violence against security forces and civilians in the east and southeast in particular, with armed offensives and bomb attacks conducted by the outlawed organization leaving scores of deaths and injuries.