Sirnak

   Sirnak is a small city in southeastern Turkey and now also the name of a new Turkish province in southeastern Anatolia. Formerly Sirnak was part of Hakkari province. On the pretext that units of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) were hiding there, the Turkish army virtually destroyed the city on 18 August 1992. Official reports put the death toll at 34, but at least another 500 were killed over the next 30 days. Sirnak thus became a byword for excessive brutality by the Turkish military in its struggle against the PKK. Similar military operations also took place against such other ethnic Kurdish towns in Turkey as Cukurca, Dargecit, Yuksekova, and Lice, among others.