PKK opens fire on military hospital, helicopter carrying wounded

PKK militants attacked a military hospital in Turkey's southeastern province of Bitlis late Sunday and also opened fire on a helicopter carrying people wounded in a suicide attack by the PKK in eastern Ağrı province. In both incidents, the attackers escaped the scene after coming under fire from Turkish security forces. The Bitlis governorate said in a written statement that members of the PKK terror organization launched an attack with long-barreled weapons from the roof of a business center.

While no casualties were reported in the incident, the sentry box of the hospital was badly damaged. Security forces are searching for the suspects.

As for the suicide bomb attack in Ağrı, in which two military personnel were killed and 24 other troops were wounded, officials said the PKK rammed an explosives-laden tractor into a military police station in the Doğubeyazıt district of Ağrı. The PKK allegedly used one of its child recruits in the suicide bombing attack.

Detailed information on the perpetrators of the Ağrı suicide attack is yet to be revealed, but reportedly, the perpetrators of suicide attacks organized by the PKK are mostly aged between 12 and 16, such as the PKK member who died in a suicide attack on Mount Gabar on July 30, according to a pro-PKK Twitter account.

In the early hours of Sunday, the PKK also organized a mine attack in Midyat in southeastern Mardin province, killing one soldier and wounding eight others. The PKK attacked an oil pipeline passing through the town of Gelinkaya in Mardin and detonated a mine as security forces arrived to secure the area. One soldier was killed in the explosion and eight more were injured in the following clashes between the militants and security forces. The wounded soldiers are currently being treated at Midyat State Hospital. Operations in the region are continuing, according to authorities.

Addressing nongovernmental organization representatives from eastern and southeastern Turkey in Ankara's Çankaya Palace, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, speaking on the same day as the recent attacks, said Turkey's firm stance against terrorist organizations in the region, including the PKK, the Revolutionary People's Liberation Party-Front (DHKP-C) and the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) has prevented the country from being dragged into a more severe wave of violence like that seen in Kobani in Syria.

Ankara recently launched airstrikes against ISIS and PKK positions in Syria and Iraq. Last week, Turkish jets bombed PKK camps in northern Iraq for the first time in the last two-and-a-half years.