Eight Turkish soldiers and six members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) were killed Friday in clashes in the largely Kurdish region of southeast Turkey, a Turkish military statement said.
Six soldiers were killed and eight were wounded when clashes broke out with rebels in Hakkari province on Friday. Two additional soldiers died when a military helicopter sent to the area later crashed due to a technical fault.
Meanwhile, four suspected bomb makers were killed near Diyarbakir late Thursday, Turkish interior ministry officials said.
Security officials said the blast occurred when PKK militants were loading the explosives onto a truck.
The late-night explosion occurred hours after at least seven people were injured in a car-bomb attack near a military facility in a suburb of the capital, Istanbul.
There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the car-bomb attack.