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Landmine kills soldier, injures two in southeast Turkey

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey, July 27, 2006 (AFP) - A Turkish soldier was killed and two others injured in the southeast of the country Thursday in a landmine explosion blamed on Kurdish rebels, security sources said.

The explosion occurred during a sweep in rural areas near the town of Genc, in Bingol province, the sources said.

Attacks using remote-controlled landmines are a hallmark of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has stepped up violence in the mainly Kurdish region since it called off a unilateral truce in June 2004.

The Turkish army intensified its operations against the PKK after 15 members of the security forces were killed in recent fighting with the rebels based in the mountains of neighbouring northern Iraq.

Ankara says the PKK uses northern Iraq as a springboard for attacks inside Turkey and has threatened a cross-border operation if Washington and Bagdad fail to crack down on the organisation regarded as a terrorist group by Turkey, the European Union and the United States.

More than 37,000 people have been killed since 1984, when the PKK took up arms for self-rule in the southeast of the country.