Ankara // Kurdish militants are holding a dozen customs officials hostage, the Turkish army said on Sunday, two days after they went missing in the Van region.
There had been uncertainty over the fate of the 11 customs officers and their driver but the army confirmed they had been abducted at the Kapikoy border crossing with Iran by the “separatist terror organisation”, its usual phrase for the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, to which it never refers by name.
Abductions by the PKK are relatively common and usually end peacefully. But there were no further details over the situation of the customs officials.
In a separate incident, one soldier was killed and three others wounded in clashes with PKK militants in the the Kurdish-dominated south-east, the army said.
The PKK militants attacked the soldiers guarding a hydroelectric dam just after dawn with rockets and long-range gunfire in Kulp district of the Diyarbakir region.
The army said a ground and air operation was launched to “neutralise” the attackers.
The PKK has been staging daily attacks against the Turkish armed forces, ending a ceasefire in effect since 2013, after the military launched air raids and military operations against the group’s strongholds in south-east Turkey as well as northern Iraq.
A court on Sunday ordered three mayors in the Diyarbakir region detained on charges of seeking to destroy national unity by supporting calls for regional self-rule.
The official Anatolia news agency said those arrested included the co-mayors of the central Sur district of Diyarbakir city, Seyid Narin and Fatma Sik Barut.
It is common in Turkey’s Kurdish regions for posts to be shared between a man and a woman to promote gender equality.
Also remanded in custody by the Diyarbakir court was Yuksel Bodakci, the mayor of the town of Silvan, as well as two other municipal officials from Sur.
Anatolia said they had been charged with seeking “to break up the unity of the state and integrity of the country”. It is not clear when the trial will start.
All of them are members of the Democratic Regions Party, which has close ties to Turkey’s main pro-Kurdish political force the Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP).
Turkish media reports said they had been initially detained on Wednesday as part of an investigation into moves by some Kurdish-dominated regions in Turkey to declare “self rule” since the latest crisis took hold.
Reports said that so-called people’s assemblies in districts including Silopi and Cizre in Sirnak province had declared self-rule and would no longer recognise state institutions.
Tensions are high in the south-east after the Turkish military launched its campaign against the PKK.
According to figures published by Anatolia on Saturday, 812 PKK militants have been killed in the campaign while 56 members of the Turkish security forces have lost their lives.
* Agence France-Presse