Rebels battle Turkish troops

Fierce new fighting flared Saturday between Turkish troops and Kurdish rebels after months of relative calm. Fifteen soldiers and at least 23 separatists were killed.

The military called in helicopters, fighter planes and heavy artillery after the Kurdish separatists struck an army outpost in southeastern Turkey early Friday, apparently overwhelming the defenders. The fighting near the border with Iraq, which also wounded 20 soldiers, represented Turkey’s largest loss of troops this year in a single incident.

In an indication of how seriously Turkey viewed the incident, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan cut short a visit to the former Soviet republic of Turkmenistan to return to the capital, Ankara.

The fighting was considered likely to spur military strikes on rebel hide-outs across the border in northern Iraq. Within hours of the rebel attack, the military was firing artillery across the frontier.

“We have no doubt they [the Kurdish rebels] will receive the response they deserve, in the harshest way,” Koksal Toptan, the parliament speaker, told reporters in Ankara. Most of the deaths on the Turkish side were in or near the outpost that was attacked near Aktutun, about five miles from the Iraqi frontier.

Turkey’s military is far better equipped and stronger than the fighters of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, and the rebels’ ability to inflict a large number of deaths in a fortified army position constitutes a significant propaganda victory for the separatists, and a demoralizing blow for Turkey.

News reports said two soldiers were missing after the outpost attack, suggesting that they may have been captured. The rebels try to take prisoners whenever they can to fuel a sense of frustration and helplessness among the Turkish people.

The fighting came days before Turkish lawmakers are to take up a measure that would give the army continued authority in the coming year to stage strikes across the border in Iraq. Late last year and in the early months of 2008, Turkish troops waged an intense campaign of incursions into Iraq in an effort to root out the rebels.

The PKK, which has been designated a terrorist organization by the United States and the European Union, has been waging a sporadic battle for a separate Kurdish homeland for nearly 25 years.

Bush administration officials have expressed concern that the spillover of the Turkish-Kurdish conflict into northern Iraq could leave U.S. troops caught between two forces friendly to the United States -- NATO member Turkey, and the semiautonomous Kurdish administration in northern Iraq.

The renewed fighting comes only a month after Gen. Ilker Basburg took over as head of Turkey’s powerful military. Observers have been watching closely to see how harsh a stance he will take toward the Kurdish separatists.

--

laura.king@latimes.com