Turkey says two of its soldiers killed, eight wounded in northern Iraq

Two Turkish soldiers were killed and eight others were wounded on Saturday in a clash during operations into northern Iraq, Turkey’s defense ministry said.

Six militants, including a woman, were “neutralized” during the operations, the ministry said in a statement. The Turkish army uses the term neutralize when it has killed, captured or wounded combatants.

Turkey regularly carries out air strikes on PKK bases in northern Iraq, as President Tayyip Erdogan pursues his aim of ending the militant group’s presence near Turkey’s borders.

The PKK, considered a terrorist organization by the United States, the European Union and Turkey, has waged a three-decade insurgency in Turkey’s largely Kurdish southeast that has killed about 40,000 people.