The three assailants, believed to be from the separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), attacked a traffic police team on a highway near the city of Iskenderun, killing one officer at the spot, police officials told Anatolia.

A second policeman died in hospital later after the fighting, which lasted about an hour.

Three civilians, including a toddler, were wounded.

The militants then comandeered a car and sped off, prompting a police chase that resulted in a shootout in a mountainous area nearby. The security operation was still continuing.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist group by Ankara and much of the international community, took up arms for self-rule in Turkey's mainly Kurdish southeast in 1984, prompting a conflict that has claimed about 44,000 lives.