Three soldiers killed, two security forces injured in clashes in Turkey's southeast

Three soldiers have been killed and one has been wounded in clashes with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers? Party (PKK) in the southeastern province of Diyarbak?r?s Hani and Lice districts, while a police officer was wounded after PKK members attacked the district police department in the province?s Ba?lar district.

In a written statement issued on Aug. 19, the Turkish General Staff said the two soldiers were killed in clashes with members of the PKK in Hani, where PKK members tried to join a group of around 150 people who had formed a human shield on the road linking the main road between Diyarbak?r and the neighboring province of Bingöl at around 7:30 p.m. 

PKK members attempted to join the group at around 8:55 p.m. when clashes erupted between militants and the gendarmerie forces. 

Two soldiers, non-commissioned officer Metin Aydemir and specialized sergeant Latif Ad?güzel, were killed in the clashes, and another fellow soldier was injured, the statement read.

The PKK?s military wing did not immediately issue a statement about the clash.

In a separate statement, the Turkish General Staff stated on Aug. 19 that a lieutenant, Ubeyd Turan, had succumbed to his injuries in the hospital where he was taken after being wounded in the clashes with the PKK at around noon on Aug. 18 in the Lice district of Diyarbak?r. 

Turan was among the three soldiers wounded when specialized sergeant Muhammet Tufan was killed in Lice on Aug. 18.

A funeral ceremony was organized for the three soldiers in the Diyarbak?r Military Hospital on Aug. 19, after which they were sent to their hometowns. Aydemir will be laid to rest in the northeastern province of Erzurum, Ad?güzel in the Central Anatolian province of Nev?ehir and Tufan in...