Turkey Admits 8 Its Troops Missing After Ambush

By VOLKAN SARISAKAL

Associated Press Writer

Oct 22, 2007

The Turkish military confirmed Monday that eight of its soldiers were missing after an ambush attack by Kurdish rebels in which 12 other soldiers were killed.

The confirmation from the military came as dozens of military vehicles headed toward the Iraq border and protesters across the country demanded tough action against the rebels. The attack has pushed Turkey closer to a possible incursion into Iraq to target Kurdish insurgents hiding there.

"Despite all search efforts, no contact has been established with eight missing personnel since shortly after the armed attack on the military unit," the military said in a statement posted on its Web site.

An AP Television News cameraman saw a convoy of 50 military vehicles, loaded with soldiers and weapons, heading from the southeastern town of Sirnak toward Uludere, closer to the border with Iraq.

It was unclear whether the vehicles were being sent to reinforce troops engaged in fighting with rebels on Turkish soil, or were preparing for possible cross-border action. Tens of thousands of Turkish troops are already deployed in the border area.

About 2,000 protesters in Istanbul, mostly members of an opposition party, denounced the attack and urged the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to resign, the private Dogan news agency reported.

Turkey's military said Sunday it had launched an offensive backed by helicopter gunships in retaliation for the attack, shelling rebel positions along the rugged Turkish-Iraqi border. It said 32 rebels had been killed in the offensive so far.

The military convoy included trucks carrying containers full of weapons, around a dozen artillery guns and some 150 soldiers.

The rebel attack occurred four days after Parliament authorized the government to deploy troops across the border in Iraq, amid growing anger in Turkey at perceived U.S. and Iraqi failure to live up to pledges to crack down on the rebels of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, based in northern Iraq.

Erdogan said he told Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice in a telephone conversation on Sunday night that Turkey expected "speedy steps from the U.S." in cracking down on Kurdish rebels and that Rice expressed sympathy and asked "for a few days" from him.

The United States opposes any unilateral action by Turkey, fearing it could destabilize the most stable part of Iraq.

Sunday's attack raised the death toll of soldiers in PKK attacks in the past two weeks to around 30.