Turkish PM visits ISIL-hit border region as police clash with PKK supporters

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In a show of solidarity, the Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has visited troops stationed at an outpost in Kilis province near the country’s border with Syria. Just last month, a Turkish soldier was killed in clashes with ISIL on the Syrian side of the dividing line between the two countries. Ankara has until recently been a reluctant member of the US-led coalition against Islamic State militants, however the government of President Erdogan took a radically different approach by granting the alliance access to its air bases and bombing targets inside Syria. Meanwhile, clashes broke out for a second night between security forces and pro-PKK protesters in the town of Cizre in southeast Turkey. A total of two policemen have died in the disturbances, one on Friday in Cizre and another on Saturday night in the nearby town Mardin. The leader of the country’s pro-Kurdish HDP party, Selahattin Demirtas, called on the militant PKK “to remove its finger from the trigger” a