Turkey says it will try talks before striking PKK

By Thomas Grove

SIRNAK, Turkey (Reuters) - Turkey said on Monday it would exhaust diplomatic channels before launching any military strike into northern Iraq to root out Kurdish rebels, who killed at least a dozen Turkish soldiers in fighting over the weekend.

Turkey has built up its forces along the border with Iraq in preparation for an incursion against rebel bases, although Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has pressed Iraq to curb the Kurdish separatists first.

"If expected developments do not take place in the next few days, we will have to take care of our own situation," Erdogan said on Monday.

President George W. Bush expressed his "deep concern" about Kurdish rebel attacks and told Turkish President Abdullah Gul the U.S. would continue to urge Iraq's government to act against the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) rebels, the White House said.

Bush also spoke with Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and the two agreed to work with Turkey to prevent the rebels from carrying out attacks from Iraqi soil.

"We want the Iraqi government to take swift action to stop the activity of the PKK," White House spokesman Tony Fratto said. "We do not want to see wider military action on the northern border."

Washington and Baghdad have been calling on NATO-member Turkey to refrain from a major military push into the largely autonomous Kurdish region, one of the few relatively stable areas of Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion of 2003.

In a statement received by Reuters in Baghdad, the PKK said it was ready to "extend the hand of peace again and we are ready for dialogue with others to solve the issue", if Ankara stopped its military operations against Kurdish fighters.

"But if Turkey continues with its hostile position against (the) Kurdish people, we will defend ourselves and our people."

Turkey has fought for decades against the PKK, which wants an independent homeland in southeast Turkey and northern Iraq.

Erdogan is under public and military pressure to strike in Iraq against the group, which has killed some 40 Turkish soldiers in the past month.

DIPLOMATIC MEANS

But he has been resisting a cross-border operation and his foreign minister, Ali Babacan, said: "We will try all diplomatic means before carrying out any military operation."

On a visit to Britain, Erdogan said Turkey had agreed with the Iraqi government that it was important for Iraq to take concrete steps to end rebel activities in the north.

"The fact this is not taking place renders the possibility of Turkey using her right of self-defense inevitable," he said in Oxford, speaking through an interpreter.