ANKARA, Turkey, Feb. 23 (UPI) -- Turkish military officials say fire from ground troops and helicopter gunships have killed 79 Kurdish rebels in northern Iraq.
Turkey's army also reported seven Turkish soldiers died in Friday's incursion against members of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, the PKK, Sky News reported Saturday. Earlier, a PKK spokesman said five of its members had been wounded and 22 Turkish soldiers killed. Neither report could be independently confirmed.
The United States and the United Nations have urged Turkey to use restraint during the incursion, which Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan called limited in scale, the BBC reported.
"The target, purpose, size and parameters of this operation are limited," Erdogan said on Turkish television. "Our armed forces will come back in the shortest time possible as soon as they achieve their objectives" against the PKK.
More than 30,000 people have been killed since the PKK began fighting for an independent Kurdish homeland in southeastern Turkey in 1984. The PKK's main hideouts are in northern Iraq near the Turkish border.
