Three soldiers were killed in southeastern Semdinli town near the border with Iraq and Iran early Sunday, as suspected members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) set off a remote-controlled mine as a military vehicle passed by, security sources said.

Three other soldiers were wounded in the explosion, they added.

Late Saturday, a militiaman was killed and three others wounded in an attack on a military police station in Midyat town near the Syrian border in southeast Turkey, the sources said.

PKK rebels opened fire on the station while village guards, local people who help the army in its fight against the PKK, were changing guard, Anatolia news agency said.

Meanwhile two PKK rebels died in Yuksekova town in the southeast when a mine they were handling exploded early Sunday, sources said.

The conflict with the PKK, blacklisted as a terrorist group by the European Union and the United States as well as Turkey, has claimed more than 45,000 lives since it began in 1984.