PKK stages suicide attack in E Turkey-army sources

TUNCELI, Turkey, June 23 (Reuters) Two Kurdish separatists rammed an oil-filled truck into a police station in eastern Turkey today in a suicide attack, army sources said.

After the explosion, the station was attacked by other members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and the army responded with an operation supported from the air, the sources said.

The two militants in the truck were killed but no further details were available on the death toll.

Violence in the mainly Kurdish southeast has escalated in recent months and dozens of soldiers and paramilitary police have been killed.

The armed forces have called for an operation into northern Iraq to deal with militants based there and a large attack could increase pressure on the government to agree to one.

Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has said he agrees with the army over northern Iraq, and has said an operation may be launched if necessary, but has not reconvened parliament to approve such a move.

The PKK, blamed for a deadly suicide bombing in Ankara last month, has been fighting for a homeland since 1984.

REUTERS RKM BST0135