One soldier and three militants had been killed in two separate clashes overnight in eastern Turkey, security officials said on Tuesday. They said the soldier was killed in fighting with Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) guerrillas in Gumushane province near the Black Sea – normally not the rebels’ area of activity. In a separate gun battle in the Erzincan province, three Maoist rebels were killed and five soldiers were wounded when a military patrol team stopped a truck carrying some 10 militants. Two rebels were captured and the others escaped. The latest violence comes amid speculation that Turkey will launch a military incursion against PKK rebels based in the mountains of northern Iraq. Turkey is currently carrying out major military operations against the guerrillas in the southeast, where it has stationed some 150,000 soldiers.