Rebel commanders invited reporters to an armed camp high in the Qandil Mountains of northern Iraq near the borders of Turkey and Iran to announce their hopes for an end to a conflict which has left at least 37,000 dead.

"It's very important, but it's not enough," said Murat Karyilan, the party's second in command, flanked by military commanders in combat fatigues. "There's a lot to do from our side and from the Turkish side."

Karyilan said the only path to solve the region's problems was now through democratic dialogue between the Kurds and the governments of Turkey and Iraq, including northern Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region.

"The cadres and the base camps of the party will henceforth redirect their efforts to the political front, to make this decision work," he said, calling on the United States to join regional governments in resolving the crisis.

Henceforth, armed PKK units operating in Iraq and Turkey would no longer launch attacks, he said. He did not promise to disarm, however, and a statement from his party said PKK guerrillas would defend themselves if attacked.

The declaration came two days after jailed Kurdish leader Abdullah Ocalan appealed to the PKK to call a ceasefire, and a month after the United States nominated a general as its envoy to help resolve the conflict.

The 20-million-strong Kurdish people live spread around the highland regions of northern Iran and Iraq, southeastern Turkey and in an international refugee diaspora. They regard themselves as the world's largest stateless people.

Their longstanding dream of an independent homeland has been boosted by the success of Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region, which escaped Saddam Hussein's regime a more than a decade ago and stands aloof from Iraq's civil conflict.

But Ankara has remained opposed to self-rule for Turkey's Kurds and both Iraq and the United States have been embarrassed by continuing attacks on Turkish targets by rebels operating from over the countries' border.

Since the start of the year, 79 members of the Turkish security forces and 110 rebels have been killed, according to an AFP count based on figures provided by the Turkish army.

Ocalan, in remarks carried through his lawyers, urged Turkish authorities not to consider the declaration a mark of "weakness", but as an occasion for reconciliation between Turks and the country's Kurdish minority.

"The chance could be the last one," Ocalan warned.

This was rejected by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who demanded instead Kurdish separatists lay down their arms, saying: "A ceasefire is done between states. It is not something for a terrorist organisation."

The PKK's announcement followed a decision by the United States on August 30 to name an special envoy to coordinate the fight against the rebel group with Turkey, General Joseph Ralston, a former NATO commander.

During a visit to Ankara on Wednesday, the US envoy said Washington was urging Iraq's embattled regime to take "visible" measures against Iraq-based PKK rebels in order to eliminate the threat they pose.

The rebels took up arms for self-rule in Turkey's predominantly Kurdish southeast in 1984 and since then the PKK -- classed as a terrorist gang by the European Union and the United States -- has called no less than five truces.

The most recent was in 1999 after Ocalan was arrested. The PKK took up arms again in 2004 and has significantly increased its attacks.

Saturday's announcement came as Turkey's Anatolia news agency reported that a Turkish soldier had been killed by an alleged PKK land mine in the mainly Kurdish southeast of the country.

The incident took place in a rural area near the Iranian border as soldiers were carrying out a search operation. A second soldier received light injuries.