As polls closed Saturday, Iraqi Kurds are hoping the 2009 elections results, expected in two to three days, will help ease tensions with Baghdad over oil and land disputes that threaten the stability in the self-ruled region.

The State Department says the United States is making an all-out diplomatic effort to defuse the crisis spawned by cross-border attacks into Turkey by Iraq-based Kurdish PKK militants. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice has led the effort with telephone appeals for Turkish-Iraqi cooperation on the issue.

Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan says US secretary of state Condoleezza Rice has asked his Government to hold off on launching cross-border raids on Kurdish rebels based in northern Iraq.

Turkey's General Staff said on Sunday that the army had killed 32 Kurdish rebels while 12 Turkish soldiers had been killed and another 16 wounded in clashes near the border with Iraq.

The president of the Kurdish region in northern Iraq says the region will defend itself from any aggression, following Turkey's approval of cross-border incursions into northern Iraq to fight Kurdish rebels.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani said he believed there was no chance of a large-scale Turkish military strike against Kurdish militants in northern Iraq.

The more Ankara speaks against the recognition of the Armenian Genocide, the more countries and organizations are interested in real facts.