Three Turkish soldiers and four Kurdish separatists were killed Wednesday in two separate clashes in eastern and south- eastern Turkey, Turkish media reported Thursday, according to dpa. In the first clash in the Lice region of Diyarbakir province, two soldiers and four Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) rebels were killed and four soldiers wounded. An army major was killed and five wounded in the second clash in the eastern Turkish province of Agri. Ankara blames the separatist PKK for the deaths of more than 35,000 people since the early 1980s when the PKK began its fight for independence or autonomy for the mainly Kurdish-populated south-east of Turkey. The PKK is considered by the United States and the European Union to be a terrorist group.
