Turks sending more soldiers to Iraqi border

SIRNAK, Turkey — Dozens of Turkish military vehicles streamed toward the Iraqi border with heavy artillery and ammunition Monday after Kurdish guerrillas killed a dozen soldiers and claimed to have captured eight in an intensifying crisis threatening to spill into Iraq.

Arab nations joined the U.S. and Europe in urging Turkey's government not to attack suspected guerrilla bases in the Kurdish region of northern Iraq, while Turkish citizens rallied across the country demanding action against the rebels.

Iraq's president claimed the guerrillas would announce a cease-fire. But the rebels denied that, saying a cease-fire they declared in June was still in place.

With tensions worsening, the Turkish foreign minister said his government was pursuing a diplomatic solution to halt rebel operations out of havens in Iraq but warned that it wanted to see results soon if an escalation in military action was to be avoided.

An AP Television News cameraman saw a convoy of 50 Turkish army vehicles, loaded with soldiers and weapons, including 155mm howitzers, heading from the southeastern town of Sirnak toward Uludere, closer to the border.

Trucks towing artillery pieces covered with camouflage tarpaulins were trailed by khakicolored trucks that appeared to be loaded with ammunition. Armored personnel carriers with helmeted Turkish soldiers manning heavy machine guns escorted the trucks.

It was unclear if the vehicleswere joining troops fighting with rebels on Turkish soil or were preparing for a possible crossborder offensive, which was authorized by Turkey's Parliament last week.

At least five U.S.-made transport helicopters ferrying soldiers and Cobra helicopter gunships also were seen flying toward the frontier.

The Pentagon has said 60,000 Turkish soldiers have deployed along the border. The north is one of the few relatively calm Iraqi regions, and the U.S. fears an incursion by its ally Turkey could worsen the Iraq war.

After weeks of stepped-up clashes between Turkish troops and rebels, tensions racheted even higher after a guerrilla ambush Sunday killed 12 soldiers and left eight missing. The army said 34 rebels died in a counterattack.

The rebel Kurdistan Workers' Party said its fighters captured the missing soldiers - a claim that would make it the largest seizure since 1995, when guerrillas grabbed eight soldiers, took them to northern Iraq and held them for two years before letting them go.

"Right now, these soldiers are hostages in the hands of our forces," a senior PKK commander, Bahoz Erdal, was quoted as telling the pro-Kurdish Firat News Agency in Belgium.

Protesters waving the red and white Turkish flag demonstrated in cities nationwide to demand a tough response to the weekend ambush.

"Martyrs never die! The nation will never be divided!" demonstrators shouted in Ankara, the capital. "Martyr" is a term used by Turks for soldiers killed in combat.

Many Turks are angry at Washington over what they consider the failure of U.S. and Iraqi forces to honor pledges to crack down on the group, which is listed by the U.S. as terrorists.

Iraqi Kurds allied with Turkish forces in the 1990s to fight the PKK, a rival in their northern enclave at a time when Saddam Hussein ruled the rest of Iraq. But Iraqi Kurds are now reluctant to see an attack on their ethnic brethren from Turkey, fearing the Turks want to curb Kurdish aspirations for self-rule.

President Bush talked separately with both Turkish President Abdullah Gul and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki on Monday to express his "deep concern" about attacks on Turkish soldiers, said Gordon Johndroe, spokesman for the White House National Security Council.

In his call to Gul, Bush reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to helping combat PKK guerrillas operating out of northern Iraq, while Bush and al-Maliki agreed that "Turkey should have no doubt about our mutual commitment to end all terrorist activity from Iraqi soil," Johndroe said.

Earlier, Turkey's foreign minister said the government would pursue diplomacy before it sends troops across the rugged frontier.

"Our preference is diplomacy, but the military option is no doubt a method in the struggle against terrorism," Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said after touring the Middle East to explain Turkey's position.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, said the PKK would make a cease-fire announcement Monday, but rebels later said they already had announced a unilateral cease-fire in June.

"We're stating clearly that if the Turkish state stops its attacks, then increased tensions will be replaced with a combat-free environment," a rebel statement said.

Turkey has rejected trucesdeclared by the PKK, demanding that the rebels surrender or be killed. The rebels have pressed ahead with attacks on the grounds saying they are defending themselves against the army.

In Washington, the State Department said the United States had opened a diplomatic campaign to persuade Turkey not to invade northern Iraq. "In our view, there are better ways to deal with this issue," spokesman Sean McCormack said.

"From our perspective this is a diplomatic full-court press," Mc-Cormack said. "We want to see an outcome where you have the Turks and the Iraqis working together and we will do what we can to resolve the issue without a Turkish cross-border incursion."

However, he acknowledged that U.S. influence with NATO ally Turkey was limited, particularly after a House committee passed a resolution describing the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Armenians during the waning days of the Ottoman Empire as a " genocide," infuriating Ankara, which has threatened repercussions.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said he told Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice by telephone Sunday night that Turkey expected "speedy steps from the U.S." in quelling the PKK. He said Rice asked "for a few days."

McCormack did not dispute the account of the conversation but declined to comment on whatRice meant by asking for "a few days."

Erdogan did not specify what he meant by "speedy steps," but he has often urged the United States and Iraq to crack down on the PKK. Turkish leaders say it is the responsibility of those countries to do whatever is necessary to destroy guerrilla bases in northern Iraq.

McCormack said Rice pressed Erdogan for restraint and also spoke to the leader of Iraq's Kurdish region, Massoud Barzani, to ask for action from Iraq against the Kurdish militants.

Rice told Erdogan "we do not believe unilateral cross-border operations are the best way to address this issue," McCormack said.

She told Barzani that Iraqi authorities needed to take action against the PKK either on their own or with the Turks, McCormack said, a sentiment echoed Monday in a joint statement issued by Rice and British Foreign Secretary David Miliband, who was in Washington.

"We continue to believe that cooperation and coordination between Turkey and Iraq is the most effective means to eliminate the PKK threat," Rice and Miliband said, adding that they had proposed a three-way meeting Nov. 2-3 among the United States, Iraq and Turkey in Istanbul.

Egypt and Jordan, meanwhile, cautioned Turkey on Monday against launching an offensive into Iraq, a reflection of Arab countries' fears of widening the Iraq conflict.

Arab nations traditionally oppose any foreign incursion into a fellow Arab state, and they fear a Turkish attack could fuel separatist sentiment among Iraqi Kurds and increase the danger of Iraq's breakup. But they also have ties with predominantly Muslim Turkey and oppose Kurdish separatist movements.

"I hope that both sides, Turkey and Iraq, will sit together to find a solution to the Kurdish problem," Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak said. In Jordan, government spokesman Nasser Judeh said: "We're concerned about Iraq's security, unity and integrity." Information for this article was contributed from Ankara by Selcan Hacaoglu and Suzan Fraser, from New York by Lily Hindy and from Washington by Matthew Lee of The Associated Press.