ANKARA: A top general on Sunday accused the leaders of northern Iraq of tolerating Kurdish rebels who killed 15 Turkish soldiers in an attack staged partly from Iraqi soil.

Gen Hasan Igsiz, deputy chief of the military, said the Kurdish leadership in northern Iraq was allowing the rebels to use roads and hospitals in the region and ignoring their presence.

“We don’t receive any kind of support from the local administration in the northern part of Iraq,’’ Igsiz said. “Our expectation from them is to accept that the terrorist organisation is a terrorist organisation and eliminate the support provided to it.’’

Iraq’s central government pledged to cooperate with Turkey against the rebels after Friday’s attack.

“The Kurdistan regional government denounces the recent PKK attack on Turkish soldiers,’’ it said in a statement dated on Saturday. “We condemn this attack and we express our condolences and sorrow to the families of the victims.’’

Tens of thousands of Turks in cities across Turkey attended the funerals on Sunday of the soldiers slain in the attack. Their flag-draped coffins were carried by fellow soldiers and family members amid slogans denouncing the rebel group.

Some mourners booed Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan as he left one funeral in the town of Keskin near the capital.

Turkey has vowed to wage an all-out fight against the rebels, who also wounded 20 soldiers, the military said. Two soldiers missing in the attack are thought to be dead, Igsiz said.

Thirteen of the 15 dead were struck by shrapnel on a steep hill as they defended a military outpost situated in a valley below, Igsiz said.

The area has great strategic importance since it sits on a key route used by rebels to infiltrate into Turkey from Iraq, the general said.