ANKARA - Over 20 smugglers were killed in an air raid in Turkey's southeastern border province of Sirnak, Turkish newspaper Hurriyet Daily News reported Thursday on its website.

The air raid was conducted Wednesday night under the guidance of unmanned aerial vehicles near the Ortasu village of Uludere town in Sirnak province, which borders Iraq.

Fehmi Yaman, the mayor of Uludere, said the dead were not members of the outlawed Kurdish Workers' Party as some media reported, but diesel smuggling peasants.

The Turkish jets launched the strike at 11 pm local time ( 2100 GMT) after unmanned drones and thermal cameras detected a big group of smugglers coming from the Iraqi side of the border, and more than 20 people were confirmed killed by the governor of Sirnak, according to Turkish private Dogan News Agency.

Four bodies were brought to the Sirnak State Hospital, some others were transferred to the Ortasu village by peasants, while the rest were left under the rubble of a big rock under which they took shelter.