Turkish fighter jets killed 35 Kurds in an air strike the country’s ruling party admitted yesterday could have been a “blunder” that mistakenly hit civilians instead of Kurdish separatists.

Turkey’s military command said it had launched an air raid on Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants after a spy drone spotted a group moving toward its sensitive southeastern border under cover of darkness late Wednesday.

“According to initial reports, these people were smugglers and not terrorists,” said Huseyin Celik, vice-president of the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP).

“If it turns out to have been a mistake, a blunder, rest assured that this will not be covered up,” he told reporters in Ankara yesterday, adding that it could have been an “operational accident” by the military.

“In the name of my party I would like to express our shock and sadness,” he said, while calling on the public to await the results of an investigation.

It would be one of the deadliest incidents involving civilians in the long-running Kurdish separatist conflict in Turkey.

The country’s main pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BPD) said the planes had bombed villagers from Kurdish majority southeastern Turkey who were smuggling sugar and fuel across the border on mules and donkeys.