One of the victims was a soldier shot dead by Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels who fired upon a military patrol near Semdinli in Hakkari province, close to the border with Iraq, a security official said.

Another soldier was wounded in the fighting, added the source, speaking on condition of anonymity.

In the southern Osmaniye province, the wife of an army officer died in hospital Friday from injuries sustained in a rocket attack by PKK militants on military lodgings, the NTV news channel said.

The 22-year-old woman was on the balcony of her home when she sustained a head injury during the attack late Thursday, it added. There were no other casualties.

In the east of the country, a land mine blast blamed on the PKK hit a bus carrying troops on Friday, wounding 13 soldiers and a child, another local security source said.

The bus with civilian licence plates was carrying soldiers, all dressed in civilian clothes, back to their barracks in Tunceli province after a medical check-up in the neighbouring province of Elazig.

One of them was seriously wounded in the attack, which also injured the nine-year-old son of the bus driver, the source, speaking on condition of anonymity, added.

The Turkish army often uses civilian vehicles to transport troops in the east and southeast where the PKK has been fighting for self-rule for more than two and a half decades.

The rebels frequently employ remote-controlled mines and improvised bombs in attacks targeting Turkish security forces.

In a separate development, the Anatolia news agency reported Friday that police had arrested six people with suspected links to the PKK in connection with a planned bomb attack in the western city of Izmir.

The arrests took place in the city's Buca district, which has a large Kurdish community, added the agency, without saying when they happened.

Police found two kilogrammes (4.4 pounds) of plastic explosives and a substantial amount of a yet-unidentified type of explosive in the car in which four of the suspects were caught, the report said.

Among the two other suspects arrested later was the local head of the Peace and Democracy Party, the country's main Kurdish party which Turkish officials accuse of links to the rebels.

The PKK has in the past carried out bombings in cities and tourist resorts in the country's west.

The arrival of spring has brought a rise in violence between Turkish forces and PKK rebels operating out of bases in Turkey and neighbouring northern Iraq.

Some 45,000 people have been killed since 1984 when the PKK, listed as a terrorist group by Turkey and much of the international community, took up arms for self rule in Turkey's Kurdish-majority southeast.