While Turkish authorities use the word "neutralize" to mean either killed or taken prisoner, the Turkish news outlet Daily Sabah specified that Bozkir had been killed.
"Selman Bozkir, known under the code name 'Doctor Huseyin,' a senior leader of the PKK terrorist organization [...] was neutralized by heroes of the National Intelligence Organization yesterday [Saturday]," Erdogan tweeted.
According to the Anadolu news agency, Turkish intelligence reportedly assassinated Bozkir due to allegations that he was running a training site disguised as a refugee camp.
The Turkish government has been fighting the PKK, which seeks to establish a Kurdish autonomy in Turkey, since the early 1980s. The PKK and Ankara signed a ceasefire agreement in 2013, but it collapsed just two years later over terror attacks that Ankara blames on the Kurds.
Turkey occasionally conducts air raids targeting Kurdish militia in the north of neighboring Iraq. According to reports, one such raid on Saturday killed at least three civilians in a refugee camp in northern Iraq.
