Unknown gunmen injure 3 soldiers in southwestern Turkey

Three Turkish soldiers have sustained injuries in an armed attack against a military vehicle in the country’s southwest, national media say.

The incident occurred Wednesday in the Beldibi region, west of the resort city of Antalya, along the Mediterranean coast, where their military vehicle was attacked by unidentified gunmen, Turkey's Dogan news agency reported.

No individual or group has yet claimed the responsibility for the attack, but Ankara usually blames militants of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) for conducting such attacks against security forces.

Turkey has been suffering from bombings and clashes with the PKK since July 2015, when the government declared an end to years of efforts for reconciling with the militants and launched a military campaign against them.

The Turkish army has been conducting ground operations as well as airstrikes against PKK positions in the troubled southeastern border region as well as Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdistan region over the past months.

According to the latest toll provided by the state-run Anadolu news agency in July, more than 600 Turkish security forces and over 7,000 PKK militants have been killed since the collapse of the truce. Rights campaigners and Turkey’s pro-Kurdish political parties challenge the figure, saying many civilians have been killed.

SS