Four police officers and a major have been killed while five police officers have been injured in separate attacks by the terrorist Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Nusaybin district of the southeastern province of Mardin.
One special forces police officer was killed by sniper fire in the morning hours of Thursday.
Two police chiefs and one major were killed later when hand-made explosives planted by PKK terrorists exploded in Dicle neighborhood of Nusaybin. Five police officers were also injured in the incident. They were hospitalized at the Nusaybin State Hospital.
Former President Abdullah Gül announced on Twitter that the two police officers who were killed in the attack were Salih Taç ve Erkan Başpehlivan, who were among his security details during his post. The former president expressed his sadness over the death of the policemen and extended his condolences to their families.
Also on Thursday afternoon, another police officer was killed in a separate bomb attack.
Five soldiers and a police officer were also killed in Nusaybin last Saturday when PKK terrorists detonated explosives they planted inside a building in the district.
A settlement process launched by the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) government in late 2012 to end Turkey’s long-standing terrorism problem collapsed following a two-year-cease-fire last July, triggering the worst violence in Turkey’s southeast since 1990s. Hundreds of civilians, security forces’ members as well as PKK terrorists have been killed in the region in the renewed conflict.
The PKK is designated as a terrorist group by Ankara, Washington and Brussels. At least 40,000 people have been killed in clashes between Turkish forces and PKK terrorists since 1984.