Eight police officers died and six were wounded in a roadside mine blast Sunday blamed on Kurdish rebels in Turkey's southeast.

Members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) launched an attack around 0715 GMT Sunday as a police vehicle was passing in the Karliova district of Bingol province, southeast Turkey, the  local security sources said.

The attack comes amid an ongoing army operation in the southeast that has been concentrated in the Semdinli district and has included nearly 5,000 ground troops, according to the Turkish military.

The PKK, considered a terrorist group by Turkey and much of the international community, took up arms in the southeast in 1984, sparking a conflict that has claimed about 45,000 lives.