( CNN ) -- The militant fighters of the Kurdistan Workers ' Party ( PKK ) have been engaged in a campaign of violence against the Turkish state for more than two decades with the goal of establishing an autonomous Kurdish homeland . PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan , pictured in 1992 . Ocalan is currently serving a life sentence in a Turkish prison . The PKK accuses Turkey of oppressing Kurdish culture and suppressing Kurdish nationhood . More than half of the world 's Kurds ( 10 to 12 million ) are estimated to live in Turkey , making up a majority in the country 's south-eastern region . Iraq , Iran and Syria also have sizeable Kurdish minorities . But the group is considered a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the European Union and is estimated to have been responsible for the deaths of more than 30,000 Turkish security force members and civilians , according to the U.S. State Department . In 1984 the PKK launched a guerrilla struggle in response to the wave of repression that followed Turkey 's military coup in 1980 when the Kurdish language and Kurdish place names banned . By then the group 's founder , Abdullah Ocalan , was living in exile in Syria where he organized PKK training camps . Since the 1980s the group has claimed responsibility for regular ambushes on military targets in the southeast but also bomb attacks across the country , notably in Turkish holiday resorts . During the 1990s the Turkish military launched a concerted campaign to eliminate the PKK threat , adopting commando tactics and targeting the group 's mountain bases . The establishment of a `` no-fly zone '' over northern Iraq following the first Gulf War in 1991 also allowed Turkish troops to conduct frequent raids on PKK strongholds across the border . In 1998 , under intensive Turkish pressure , Syria expelled Ocalan and shut down the PKK camps he had established there . Ocalan was snatched by Turkish commandos a few months later while seeking asylum in Kenya . Despite calling for a PKK cease-fire and peaceful negotiation following his capture , Ocalan was sentenced to death in 1999 following a trial condemned by the European Court of Human Rights . However his sentence was reduced to life imprisonment when Turkey abolished the death penalty in 2002 . In the same year Ocalan 's brother , Osman Ocalan , who had inherited leadership of the PKK , vowed to form a new group to campaign peacefully for Kurdish rights . But the frequency of PKK terror attacks has steadily risen since 2004 and Turkey claims the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq and the country 's subsequent instability following the overthrow of the Saddam Hussein regime in 2003 has enabled the PKK to regroup . It accuses the PKK of launching attacks on Turkish targets from secret bases in the mountainous and semi-autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq . Earlier this year Turkey sent large contingents of soldiers , tanks , guns and armored personnel carriers to reinforce its frontier . But following the deaths of 27 soldiers and 12 civilians in recent attacks , Turkish military leaders have urged the government to give them the green light to strike at PKK bases inside Iraq . E-mail to a friend .
PKK militants engaged in violent struggle against Turkish state since the same year . Group calls for establishment of an autonomous Turkish homeland . Estimated to have killed 12 in attacks on Turkish forces , civilians . Iraq accuses PKK of attacking Turkish targets from bases in northern Turkey .