Police kill two PKK militants ahead of bomb attack plot

ŞIRNAK

Two outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants were killed and five were detained in the Cizre district of the southeastern province of Şırnak in an armed clash with police officers, who were raiding a house on Oct. 11 after receiving intelligence that militants were preparing a suicide bomb attack. 

The two killed militants, believed to be of Syrian-origin, were allegedly planning a suicide bomb attack against public institutions and political party representatives. 

Police said they might have been killed after the explosives they were carrying were detonated. 

Meanwhile, police in the Sur district of the southeastern province of Diyarbakır on Oct. 11 seized a stolen vehicle and 20 tons of ammonium nitrate allegedly planned to be used in potential bomb attacks by the PKK. 

The seizures came after the police launched an operation in the Ağaçlıdere neighborhood of Sur upon intelligence that two militants had arrived at an address in the area.

On Oct. 10, one soldier was killed and five others were injured in an attack by PKK militants in the Silvan district of Diyarbakır.

The clashes occurred while military units were preparing to conduct a military operation in Mount Kazan on the outskirts of the town of Silvan.

PKK militants attacked the security forces with long-barreled weapons and rocket launchers. 

One of the six soldiers injured in the attack died while being taken to hospital. The five others were taken to hospitals in Diyarbakır.