Army launches another major anti-PKK operation amid fresh attacks in east

Turkish military has started a major anti-terror operation against outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) militants in the eastern province of Tunceli, amid the latest of series of PKK attacks that injured 12 security personnel in the southeastern province of Mu?.

The army started the operation supported by an aerial campaign in rural areas between Tunceli's Pülümür and Ovac?k districts and the eastern province of Erzincan on Sept. 15. 

A main road connecting central Tunceli, Pülümür and Erzincan was blocked off at around 5 a.m. on Sept. 15 by the Tunceli Governor's Office as part of the military campaign. The road, along which a large number of military troops and armored vehicles were deployed, was blocked until Sept. 18.

In the eastern province of Mu?, 12 soldiers were wounded on the morning of Sept. 15 after PKK militants detonated an explosive targeting a military vehicle.

PKK militants detonated an explosive placed on the road while a guarded military vehicle was passing near the entry of the Suluca village. The wounded soldiers were taken to the Mu? Public Hospital.

In series of gendarmerie operations in the southeastern province of Diyarbak?r between Sept. 9 and 12, two militant shelters were discovered in Diyarbak?r province's Silvan district. The shelters contained one and a half tons of food, large numbers of everyday living material, medical equipment, a gas mask, documents, 350 Kalashnikov cases, and 500 cases with 9-mm pistols inside, the Diyarbak?r Governor's Office said in a written statement.

Ten 12-kilogram gas cylinders and 100 kilograms of ammonium nitrate, a commonly used explosive material, were also discovered buried near the shelters, the statement said.

In a separate incident in...