Eleven rebels were killed in the mountains between Pulumur and Nizamiye in the province of Tunceli, where a security operation against the separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) had been under way for the past two days, local security sources said.

Turkey's army general staff confirmed the clashes in a statement on its website and added that two other rebels were killed in a rural area of Diyarbakir province in the southeast.

Turkey stepped up action against the PKK from December and conducted several air strikes and a week-long ground incursion into northern Iraq, where it says more than 2,000 PKK rebels take refuge.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist group by Turkey and much of the international community, has been fighting for self-rule in the mainly Kurdish southeast since 1984. The conflict has claimed more than 37,000 lives.