A Japanese woman was killed and another badly injured in a stabbing attack in Cappadocia, a popular tourist area in central Turkey, the local governor said Tuesday.

The two women were attacked while hiking in the Zemi valley Monday, Governor Mehmet Ceylan was quoted as saying by the Dogan news agency.

A 22-year-old man was killed in southern Turkey after fresh protests over a teenager left in a coma during anti-government demonstrations in June, a local news agency reported Tuesday.

The man died in hospital after being hit in the head by a tear gas canister during clashes between police and protesters in the southeastern city of Antakya near the Syrian border, said the Dogan news agency.

Police and hundreds of protesters clashed Monday in Istanbul in the latest unrest over a 14-year-old left in a coma during anti-government demonstrations in June.

Police used tear gas and water cannons to attempt to disperse a crowd marching on Istanbul's main court buildings shouting "We want justice for Berkin Elvan".

Kurdish rebels have halted their pullout of Turkey, accusing Ankara of breaking its part of a ceasefire deal, but vowed to respect a truce, a pro-Kurdish news agency reported on Monday.

Under a roadmap to end the three-decade-old insurgency, the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) began in May withdrawing its fighters from Turkey to safe havens in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region.

Turkish riot police on Friday confronted hundreds of university students in Ankara throwing stones and erecting barricades in protest against a project to build a road across part of their campus.

Police fired rubber bullets and tear gas at between 200 and 300 protesters who gathered at the entrance of Middle East Technical University (METU), images broadcast on local television showed.

An Ankara court has released from jail 10 suspects, including high-ranking officers, pending the outcome of their trial for their alleged role in the 1997 bloodless coup that toppled the Islamist government.

The court on Wednesday released former four-star general Teoman Koman from custody due to ill health. Eight other former officers and a civilian suspect were released on Thursday for medical reasons or on the grounds they did not pose a flight risk.

Three Russian warships crossed Turkey's Bosphorus Strait Thursday en route to the eastern Mediterranean, near the Syrian coast, amid concern in the region over potential U.S.-led strikes in response to the Damascus regime's alleged use of chemical weapons.

The SSV-201 intelligence ship Priazovye, accompanied by the two landing ships Minsk and Novocherkassk passed through the Bosphorus known as the Istanbul strait that separates Asia from Europe, an Agence France Presse photographer reported.

Turkey has beefed up a military presence along its southern border with Syria in anticipation of strikes on the regime in Damascus, local media reported Thursday.

A 20-vehicle convoy with a tank contingent was deployed to the border area of Yayladagi in Hatay province on Wednesday, and was followed by 15 more vehicles Thursday, Turkish news agency Dogan reported.

The Turkish lira fell to another record low level against the dollar on Thursday, and the government said it would revise down its forecast for growth this year.

The lira fell to 2.0800 to the dollar in morning trading, from 2.0580 at Wednesday's close.

The U.N. refugee agency and Syria's overburdened neighbors Lebanon, Turkey, Jordan and Iraq on Wednesday urged the international community to put differences aside and find a common solution to end the "cycle of horror."

"We strongly appeal to the international community to overcome existing differences and come together to stop the fighting," Antonio Guterres, the U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees, said as he read a joint statement after talks with ministers from the four countries.