Turkey flies jets to Syrian border after death of soldier

Turkey will take "all necessary measures" to protect public order and national security following attacks by Islamic State and Kurdish militants, the prime minister's office said in a statement on Thursday.

Turkey has been hit by a wave of violence in the largely Kurdish southeast after a suspected Islamic State suicide bombing killed 32 people, many of them Kurds, in a town on the Syrian border.

Turkish forces returned fire on Islamic State militants in Syria with tank shells on Thursday after a Turkish soldier was killed and two others were wounded in a cross-border firefight, the military said.

Turkey's Nato allies have long expressed concern about control of the border with Syria, which in parts runs directly parallel with territory controlled by Islamic State. Monday's suicide bombing in the southeastern town of Suruc highlighted fears about the Syrian conflict spilling on to Turkish soil.

Stepped up security

The Turkish army has stepped up security along parts of the border, as the conflict in Syria involving Kurdish militia fighters, Islamist militants and Syrian security forces intensifies.

“Turkish soldiers returned fire after shots came from the Syrian side of the border, from the region where Islamic State militants are,” a Turkish official said, adding that, in line with the rules of engagement, four tanks returned fire after being fired upon by the militants.

The army said one sergeant had been killed and two others wounded. It said one Islamic State militant had been killed, and that Turkish forces had retrieved his body and rifle.

Another Turkish official said fighter jets had been scrambled to the Syrian border. Turkish jets regularly patrol the 900km border with Syria.

Different account

Rami Abdulrahman, founder of the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights that tracks the conflict in Syria through a network of sources on the ground, gave a different account.

The clashes erupted when two Syrian civilians tried to cross into Turkey and the army opened fire, killing one of them, an elderly man, he said. Islamic State then returned fire and two of their militants were killed, he said.

The Turkish army was not immediately available to comment.

Local media said the fighting was close to the village of Elbeyli, east of Kilis, and an area where the armed forces have sent reinforcements in recent weeks.

US military

The skirmish came as Turkey has agreed to allow the US military to launch air strikes against Islamic State militants from a US air base in Incirlik, the Wall Street Journal reported on Thursday, citing defence officials.

Local media in Turkey said an agreement was finalised late on Wednesday, but Reuters could not immediately confirm the report.

Ankara has repeatedly said it does not want to mount a unilateral incursion into Syria, but will do what is necessary to protect its border. About half of the armoured vehicles that patrol Turkey’s borders are now along the Syrian frontier.

The clashes were the latest in a wave of violence that followed Monday’s suicide bombing. Kurdish militants have retaliated by targeting police officers they accuse of collaborating with Islamic State.

One police officer was shot and killed and a second wounded on Thursday in the mainly Kurdish city of Diyarbakir, security sources said.

On Wednesday two police officers were killed in a town on the Syrian border and militants from the Kurdistan Workers Party claimed responsibility.

Reuters