Special to WorldTribune.com

ANKARA — The Kurdish Workers Party has intensified operations in Turkey.

The Turkish military has reported a PKK offensive in the southeast, which included attacks on soldiers and police.

The General Staff reported more than 10 attacks in which the PKK attacked civilian motorists and torched their vehicles.

“This [PKK] group consisted of between 200 and 250 people,” the General
Staff said.

In a statement on May 26, the military said the PKK also attacked a unit of the paramilitary Gendarmerie in the southeastern province of Diyarbakir. Other PKK operations were said to have included attacks on police special operations forces and an irrigation dam in Diyarbakir’s Hani district on May 25.

Two days later, a Turkish soldier was abducted by an alleged PKK team in Diyarbakir. The attackers, said to possess pistols and firebombs, were said to have grabbed the sergeant from his car.

Officials said the PKK was also sabotaging the Diyarbakir-Bingol
highway. They said the PKK also planted improvised explosive devices in the
southeastern province of Sirnak on May 27.

The PKK has also been accused of abducting children. The Turkish
government has demanded that the PKK release the children.

“First and foremost we stress that everyone who joins the guerrilla
ranks of the PKK does so on a voluntary basis,” a PKK commander told Turkey’s
Firat News Agency. “It is not possible for us to keep anyone in our ranks
who does not want to be there, and no one has been abducted against their
will.”

  Diyarbakir province, Gendarmerie, Kurdish Workers Party, Surge in attacks by Kurdish insurgents reported in Turkey