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DIYARBAKIR, Turkey, May 25 (AFP) - 16h25 - Five
people were killed in mainly Kurdish southeastern
Turkey on Wednesday, in the latest episode of
renewed tensions between the army and Kurdish rebels
in the region, officials said.
Two soldiers and two village guards were killed in a
rural area in the province of Batman when the
military vehicle they were travelling in drove over
a mine planted by rebels from the outlawed Kurdistan
Workers' Party (PKK), local security sources said.
Village guards are armed Kurdish militia recruited
by the government to support the army against the
PKK.
The security forces launched an operation to hunt
down the assailants, the sources said.
In the nearby province of Diyarbakir, a Kurdish
militant of Syrian nationality was shot dead when
soldiers clashed with a group of PKK rebels near the
town of Dicle, officials said.
Tensions in the southeast have escalated since last
year when the PKK ended a five-year unilateral
ceasefire with the government.
The group waged a bloody campaign for Kurdish
self-rule in the region between 1984 and 1999. The
conflict has claimed some 37,000 lives.
The Turkish army warned earlier this month that an
increasing number of PKK militants were sneaking
back into Turkey from neighboring northern Iraq,
where they had retreated after the 1999 truce.
AFP
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