Chronology: Regional crisis in northern Iraq

(Reuters) - Eight Turkish soldiers, captured last month by Kurdish guerrillas, were released on Sunday.

Turkey wants leaders of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) arrested and seeks the closure of camps in northern Iraq which they use as bases for cross-border attacks in their 23-year-old campaign for a homeland in southeast Turkey.

Here is a short chronology on recent tensions on the Turkey-Iraq border:

Sept 28, 2007 - Turkey signs an anti-terrorism deal with Iraq targeting the PKK but fails to win Baghdad's consent to allow raids across the border.

Sept 29 - Twelve civilians are killed when Kurdish rebels ambushed their minibus in Sirnak province.

Oct 7 - Kurdish rebels kill 13 Turkish soldiers in fighting in Sirnak province. Two other soldiers die the next day in separate PKK landmine explosions.

Oct 17 - Turkey's parliament approves a government request to allow troops to cross into northern Iraq.

Oct 21 - Kurdish rebels kill 12 Turkish soldiers in an ambush, prompting Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan to call talks to consider a military strike. Eight other troops are taken hostage.

-- Washington asks Turkey to hold back from sending troops into northern Iraq.

Oct 24 - Turkish warplanes attack an Iraqi village but Turkey says it wants to hold back from a major incursion to give diplomacy a chance.

Oct 29 - Helicopter gunships bomb Kurdish rebel positions in southeast Turkey and the government flexes its military muscle with big national day parades and flypasts in major cities.

Oct 31 - Turkey agrees to pursue economic sanctions against groups supporting the outlawed PKK.

Nov 2 - Visiting U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice promises "effective" action against Kurdish rebels launching attacks on Turkey from northern Iraq, but urges Ankara to refrain from military action.

-- Jailed Kurdish PKK leader, Abdullah Ocalan, says he is open to a democratic solution to the 23-year-old conflict between the Turkish military and his guerrilla group.

Nov 3 - Iraq says it is ready to hunt down and arrest Kurdish guerrilla leaders. Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki met Erdogan and Turkish President Abdullah Gul as diplomatic efforts between Turkey, Iraq and the United States intensify.

-- The regional government says it has shut down the offices of the Kurdistan Democratic Solution Party which sympathizes with the PKK.

Nov 4 - Eight Turkish soldiers, kidnapped last month, are freed in northern Iraq.