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BAGHDAD, July 10 (Reuters) - Turkey's Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan arrived in Baghdad on Thursday, seeking to strengthen ties often strained by Kurdish PKK rebels who use remote parts of northern Iraq to launch attacks on Turkish soil.

Live television pictures showed Erdogan meeting Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.

Erdogan is the first Turkish leader to travel to Baghdad since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in 2003.

His visit is also the latest sign that Iraq's neighbours are boosting ties with Baghdad as violence falls to four-year lows.

Turkey's military campaigns against Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) rebels in Iraq's largely autonomous Kurdistan region often draw protests from Iraqi officials. Ankara has been highly critical of Baghdad's failure to deal with the guerrillas.

The PKK, which wants to establish an ethnic homeland in southeast Turkey, uses the area as a base from which to stage attacks on targets inside neighbouring Turkey.

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, led a delegation of senior Iraqi officials to Turkey in March, in a visit Erdogan said at the time would hopefully begin a "new page in Turkish-Iraqi relations".

Turkey is one of Iraq's most important trading partners. Turkish firms and products dominate northern Iraq's economy.

(Writing by Mohammed Abbas: Editing by Dean Yates)

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