PKK blasts kill civilian, hurt guards in SE Turkey

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey (Reuters) - Three people were killed and a dozen were wounded on Friday in a series of explosions in southeast Turkey blamed on separatist Kurdish guerrillas, security sources told Reuters.

The three landmine blasts, set off by remote control, took place in the southeastern provinces of Siirt and Batman and in eastern Bingol province, said security sources, who declined to be named.

Ankara is conducting a military operation, backed by attack helicopters, tanks and artillery against separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) guerrillas in the restive and mountainous parts of southeast Turkey.

Amid widespread public anger over PKK attacks, the government has sent tens of thousands of troops to the border region. Over the week dozens of Turkish F-16 warplanes have also gone on bombing raids against suspected PKK positions deep inside neighboring northern Iraq.

Turkey blames the PKK for the deaths of nearly 40,000 people, mostly Kurds, since the group began its armed campaign for an ethnic homeland in southeast Turkey in 1984.

President Abdullah Gul said the military's latest air strikes against the rebels in northern Iraq were among the most significant blows yet against the separatist movement.

"I can say we are in an important period in terms of Iraq and the struggle with the PKK," Gul told reporters during a Europe Day reception in Ankara.

Turkey says several thousands of PKK rebels use a remote, mountainous part of northern Iraq as a base from which to stage attacks on targets inside Turkey. Iraqi authorities say they are keen to cooperate with NATO member Turkey but complain that they have no control over the isolated part of the oil-rich country.

The tensions over the PKK, considered a terrorist organization by the United States, Turkey and the European Union, in northern Iraq has helped boost global oil prices.

The Turkish military said on Saturday it had killed more than 150 PKK members in air strikes in May. The rebel group denied this.

Thousands of Turkish troops conducted an eight-day large-scale incursion into Iraq in February in which the military said it killed 240 guerrillas and lost 27 of its own men.

SERIES OF BLASTS

Three people were killed and five wounded on Friday when a landmine detonated by the PKK destroyed their minibus in the Batman province, security sources said. One of those killed was a village teacher.

"Our assessment is that the explosion, which targeted a minibus carrying villagers, was remotely detonated. We have sent a helicopter to the site," Batman governor Recep Kizilcik told Reuters.

He said members of the state "village guard" militia were traveling in the minibus.

The PKK, which still attracts strong support in mainly Kurdish southeast Turkey due to economic hardship and perceptions of political repression, frequently plants mines targeting security forces.

In a separate attack, a military officer and a member of a village guard militia were injured in a landmine blast in Siirt province. In another attack, an officer and two other soldiers were injured while on patrol when a landmine planted by PKK exploded under their vehicle in Bingol province, sources.

They were flown by helicopter to a nearby hospital and were not seriously injured.

(Additional reporting by Zerin Elci in Ankara and Daren Butler in Istanbul; writing by Paul de Bendern, editing by Philippa Fletcher)