Turkey's top officials gathered Wednesday at the funeral ceremony in Ankara for the police officers killed by PKK terrorists in Turkey's eastern Iğdır province on Tuesday. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu, former President Abdullah Gül, other high-level officials, relatives of the police officers and several members of the public attended the funeral for the slain officers Ali Koç and Fehmi Şahin,
A total of 14 police officers were killed Tuesday in Turkey's eastern Iğdır and Tunceli provinces in two separate PKK attacks. One of the killed police officers in Iğdır was Fehmi Şahin, who served many years as one of the guards of former President Abdullah Gül. Gül said on his twitter account on Tuesday, "It hurts so bad in our hearts with a new pain every day," adding, "I am deeply sad for losing Fehmi and his brothers in arms to terror."
The police officers in Iğdır were killed while escorting customs officials on duty at the Dilucu border crossing between Turkey and Azerbaijan. Just as the bus was passing a village in the district, PKK terrorists detonated bombs planted on the road. The security forces launched an operation in the region to track the PKK terrorists responsible for the ambush.
In a separate incident on Tuesday, a 55-year-old special ops police officer Kadri Özkara was traveling from Erzincan to Tunceli when he noticed that terrorists had blocked the road and then tried to flee; however, Özkara was gunned down by the PKK before he could escape. The police officer's daughter is reported to have escaped the attack uninjured.
The media agencies reported earlier that another group of three police officers were killed in a bomb attack in Turkey's southeastern district of Cizre in the Şırnak province on Tuesday, but they then withdrew their reports. The Şırnak governorate also denied the reports claiming that the officers were killed. The Şırnak governorate said that a total of four police officers were wounded in a PKK rocket attack on an armored vehicle, but no casualties were reported.
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