Separatist Kurdish rebels killed 13 Turkish soldiers and wounded seven others Thursday, July 14 in a rare dayside ambush in southeastern Turkey, the deadliest attack on troops in more than three years.

The ambush near the village of Dolapdere in southeastern Diyarbakir province prompted Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to hold an emergency meeting in the Turkish capital of Ankara with top military and intelligence officials.

A Kurdish rebel ambush in October 2007 had left 12 soldiers dead along the Turkish-Iraqi border and triggered a weeklong air and ground assault in early 2008 against Kurdish rebel bases in northern Iraq. That was the last major incursion by the Turkish military.

Kurdish rebels periodically cross the border to stage attacks in their war for autonomy for Turkey's predominantly Kurdish southeast. Nearly 40,000 people have died in the conflict since the rebels launched their first armed attack in 1984, AP reported.