Kurdish rebels 'kill 24 Turkish soldiers'

At least 24 Turkish soldiers have been killed in clashes with Kurdish rebels at several police and army posts in south-east Turkey, reports say.

The attacks, in the mainly Kurdish province of Hakkari, are thought to have inflicted the biggest loss on Turkish security forces in years.

The attacks come a day after a blast in the south-east Bitlis province killed five police officers and three others.

The area has recently seen a spike in violence by Kurdish rebels.

Turkey has responded with a police crackdown on suspected rebel sympathisers and air strikes on Kurdish sites in northern Iraq.

Rebels are seeking greater autonomy in the country's Kurdish-dominated south-east, and have killed dozens of members of the country's security forces, and at least 17 civilians, since mid-July.

Tens of thousands of people have died in the conflict since 1984.

Army responds
The latest violence - thought to be simultaneous overnight attacks - is said to have taken place in several locations in Cukurca and the district of Yuksekova overnight on Tuesday to Wednesday.

Gov Muammer Turker confirmed the attacks had taken place, the Associated Press said, but there has been no immediate claim of responsibility from the Kurdish rebel movement, the PKK.

Television reports said the army had begun an air-supported operation against the rebels in response and the head of the general staff and some commanders had gone to the region, reported AFP news agency.

"Turkey will not be shaken by terror... We will do whatever we can do to finish this," President Abdullah Gul said in televised remarks quoted by AFP.

The prime minister and foreign minister had both cancelled overseas trips in response to the bloodshed, reports said.

Correspondents say such attacks will add to pressure on the government to devise a more effective strategy for combating the PKK.

The government has already said it will ask the police to play a bigger role in counter-insurgency, but this idea has been challenged by critics who argue that the police are no better equipped to tackle the PKK than the army is.

The BBC's Jonathan Head, in Istanbul, says there is little talk now of renewing the so-called "democratic opening", an initiative from two years ago, which aimed to end the conflict in the south-east by expanding the rights of the Kurdish minority.