Turkish troops killed 20 Kurdish guerrillas on Sunday in a major operation against separatist rebels in eastern Turkey, army sources said. The operation involved 8,000 troops with air support in the eastern province of Tunceli, hundreds of kilometres from the Iraqi border. The source gave no details on army casualties. Ankara also feels threatened by Kurdish separatists using bases in mountainous northern Iraq for attacks on Turkey, and TurkeyÂ’s foreign minister said a military solution was still on the table to tackle these rebels. The outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) has killed about 40 people in the past month, including 12 soldiers in the latest major attack, and said it took eight soldiers prisoner.
In Istanbul, police in riot gear and armoured vehicles scuffled with demonstrators calling for the PKKÂ’s jailed leader to be freed and protesting against an incursion into northern Iraq. Protesters hurled petrol bombs after some 200 people marched chanting through the streets. In nearby Izmit, three people at an anti-PKK demonstration were slightly injured by an explosion that bomb experts were investigating, the state news agency Anatolian reported. Other demonstrations were held across the country.