The PKK, listed as a terrorist organisation by Ankara and much of the international community, notably stepped up violence this year.

  The army has launched a large-scale operation against the group in eastern and southeastern Turkey and massed troops on the border with Iraq, fuelling talk of a cross-border operation to strike at rebels camps there.

  According to a tally compiled by human rights activists from official and independent sources, 111 members of the security forces, 109 PKK members and five civilians were killed in the first six months of the year in eascalating violence in the region.

  The PKK took up arms for self-rule in Turkey's east and southeast in 1984. The conflict has claimed more than 37,000 lives.