By Seda Sezer
ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Suspected Kurdish militants ambushed a Turkish military bus on its way to a naval base in the western province of Izmir on Thursday in an attack which police said killed one soldier and wounded at least 11 people.
Dogan news agency said Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) rebels detonated explosives on the road before opening fire on the vehicle at around 8 am (0500 GMT) near Foca, a small resort town on the Aegean coast where there is a naval base. The soldiers in the bus returned fire, it said.
Police declined to comment on who could be behind the assault. Attacks on military vehicles are common in south-east Turkey, but are rare in the west of the country.
Television images showed the bus with its windows blown out and glass strewn across the road, and investigators in white overalls searching the scene.
Wounded soldiers were taken to a nearby hospital for treatment, a police spokeswoman said. It was unclear if the 11 injured people included any civilians.
The attack came at a time of intensified clashes between the army and the PKK, which has fought a 28-year separatist conflict in Turkey in which more than 40,000 people have died, most of them Kurds.
The rebels have fought for autonomy in the country's mainly Kurdish southeast since 1984. Turkey, the United States and the European Union list the PKK as a terrorist organisation.
With fighting centred close to the Syrian border, Turkish officials believe Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is arming PKK rebels, following a sharp deterioration of ties between the two countries since the start of the Syrian uprising 17 months ago.
Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan has been one of Assad's most vocal critics.
Turkey's Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu repeated the allegations about Assad arming the PKK while travelling to Myanmar overnight, according to Turkish media.
"Assad gave them weapons support. Yes - this is not a fantasy. It is true. We have taken necessary measures against this threat."
Turkish armed forces have clashed with PKK fighters around the region of Semdinli, close to the borders with Iraq and Syria, since late July.
Erdogan said 115 PKK militants had been killed in the fighting there so far. Journalists and other non-residents have been barred entry to the area.
Murat Karayilan, the acting PKK leader, last week said the group was changing tactics with its battle in Semdinli, according to Firat News, a website close to the militants.
Instead of their traditional hit-and-run ambushes on Turkish security forces, PKK fighters will remain positioned in Semdinli in an attempt to form a stronghold there, he said.
(Reporting by Seda Sezer; Writing by Daren Butler and Alexandra Hudson; Editing by Pravin Char)
