President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has vowed that Turkey would press on with its relentless campaign against Kurdish militants "until not one terrorist" was left, as Ankara launched new air strikes against the rebels.
Turkey is currently pressing a two-pronged "anti-terror" offensive against Islamic State (IS) jihadists in Syria and PKK militants in northern Iraq and the southeast following a wave of attacks.
But, so far, the air strikes have overwhelmingly concentrated on the separatist Kurdish rebels, who have responded by tearing up a 2013 ceasefire and waging a bloody campaign against the security forces.
Also Read
"We will continue our fight until weapons are laid down... and not one single terrorist remains within our borders," Erdogan said in a televised speech in Ankara yesterday.
He said the weapons of the PKK and other militant groups must be buried "under concrete" to show they were no longer a threat to the Turkish state.
"I'm not talking about laying down arms, I'm talking about burying them. I'd like to emphasise this," Erdogan said.
Turkish warplanes overnight staged a fresh wave of attacks on Kurdish militant targets following a day of bloody attacks that killed six members of the security forces.
The overnight strikes hit 17 PKK targets in the southeastern province of Hakkari, destroying them all, the army said.
On Monday, four Turkish police officers were killed in a roadside bombing in the southeastern province of Sirnak while a Turkish soldier was killed in a rocket attack on a military helicopter.
Meanwhile in Istanbul, a senior police officer in charge of the city's bomb disposal department was killed in clashes that followed a pre-dawn suicide bombing.
The PKK yesterday claimed that attack, confirming that three of its militants had been killed, including a suicide bomber, and dismissing claims a smaller leftist group had been behind the strike.
In new violence overnight, a Turkish soldier was killed in a gun attack on a military post in Sirnak, also blamed on the PKK.
Two Turkish F-16s then last afternoon destroyed PKK targets in Sirnak province, the army said.
According to an AFP toll, 29 members of the security forces have been killed in violence linked to the PKK since the current crisis began.
