"We have no support at all from the northern Iraqi administration (against the rebels). Let aside any support, they are providing (the rebels with) infrastructural capabilites such as hospitals and roads," General Hasan Igsiz, the army's deputy chief, told a press conference.

He was speaking after 15 Turkish soldiers were killed Friday when a group of militants from the separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) -- sneaking in from their long-time bases in northern Iraq -- attacked a border outpost under cover of heavy weapons fire from northern Iraq.

The general also accused Iraqi Kurds of failing to prevent PKK militants from mixing with the local population, thus making it difficult for the Turkish army to target the rebels in a series of bombing raids it has carried out in northern Iraq since last October.

"Members of the organisation are based very close to the local population in large parts of northern Iraq and they are exploiting this," he said. "The northern Iraqi administration makes no effort to prevent this."

"Our expectation is that (the PKK) be ackowledged as a terrorist organisation there and that support for the rebels be eliminated," Igsiz said.

Ankara has long accused the Iraqi Kurds of tolerating the PKK on their territory, where it says the militants easily obtain weapons and explosives for attacks on Turkish targets across the border.

The Iraqi authorities have repeatedly pledged efforts to curb the PKK, but say that the group's hideouts are in mountainous regions to which access is difficult.

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