Kurdish militants detonated a car bomb Sunday outside a military checkpoint in southeast Turkey, killing ten soldiers and eight civilians, the prime minister said. Turkey immediately launched a military operation against the rebels in response.
(FOX)- Prime Minister Binali Yildirim gave the death toll during a press conference in Istanbul and condemned the attack.
“For the stability of our country, we will continue doing everything we can to save our homeland and our nation from the forces of terrorism,” he said.
Cuneyit Orhan Toprak, governor of Hakkari province where the attack took place, told that private news channel NTV that 27 others wounded in the attack were rushed to nearby hospitals for treatment. Eleven of them were soldiers, the Turkish military said.
Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency, citing a statement by the Turkish Armed Forces, said the attack occurred at 9:45 a.m. outside a Gendarmerie checkpoint on the Semdinli-Yuksekova highway and was the work of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK. The checkpoint is 12 miles from the town of Semdinli.
Toprak said the attackers first opened fire on the soldiers at the checkpoint to distract them before driving up a minivan containing about 5 tons of explosives and detonating it. The explosion produced a crater 50 feet wide and 23 feet deep. An infantry station located behind the checkpoint also suffered heavy damage.
(Photo Credit: IHA via AP and Fox News)