5 Kurdish Rebels Killed in Clash in Turkey's Southeast

Five Kurdish rebels were killed Tuesday in a clash with Turkish security forces in Kurdish majority southeast, Anatolia news agency reported.

The five Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) fighters, two of them women, were killed in Tatvan town in Bitlis province, a day after a similar clash in neighboring Siirt province left two rebels dead.

Fighting usually escalates in spring as snow melts along the mountainous Iraqi-Turkish border, enabling rebels holed up in rough terrain to launch attacks more easily.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey and by much of the international community, took up arms in Kurdish-majority southeast Turkey in 1984, sparking a conflict that has claimed some 45,000 lives.