October 16, 2008 -- The Turkish military clashed with Kurdish rebels near the Iraqi border in battles it said killed four soldiers and five rebels, while rebels claimed Thursday to have shot down a Turkish helicopter.
Another soldier was killed and 15 security personnel were slightly injured in the helicopter crash, the military said Thursday in a Web site statement.
The four soldiers were killed late Wednesday when rebels from the Kurdistan Workers Party opened fire on the soldiers in the province of Hakkari following an explosion, the statement reported. Hakkari is where the borders of Turkey, Iraq and Iran meet.
The military also said five PKK rebels were killed in two separate clashes in Hakkari and in the neighbouring province of Sirnak, which also borders Iraq.
The military said the helicopter crashed due to a technical fault while trying to block the rebels' escape in the Hakkari clash. In Iraq however, the PKK said its fighters had shot down the helicopter.
"The helicopter was brought down by an ambush planned by PKK fighters," PKK spokesman Ahmed Deniz said.
The PKK, considered a terrorist organisation by the United States and the European Union, has been fighting for autonomy in southeast Turkey since 1984. Tens of thousands of people have died in the conflict since then.
Turkey has launched several cross-border airstrikes against the PKK in northern Iraq since a rebel attack October 3 killed 17 soldiers.
Kurdish rebels have stepped up attacks since then, killing four policemen and a civilian in an ambush in the Kurdish-dominated southeastern city of Diyarbakir last week. Turkish police also captured a potential Kurdish female suicide bomber who was posing as a pregnant woman in downtown Istanbul.