The Turkish Air Force launched bombing raids in Iraq yesterday Tuesday against Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebel positions, authorities in the autonomous region of Iraqi Kurdistan said, citing "human casualties."
"Turkish fighter jets targeted several positions of militants of the PKK," Turkish Kurdish separatist movement, mainly in the Mahmur and Sinjar (north) regions, Kurdistan's anti-terrorism agency said in a statement, without giving a specific casualty count.
The PKK, an organisation labelled "terrorist" by Ankara and its Western allies, has rear bases and training camps in the Sinjar region and in mountainous areas of Iraqi Kurdistan, which borders Turkey.
Ankara, which has de facto established several dozen military bases for 25 years in Iraqi Kurdistan, launched in spring 2021 its ninth large-scale military operation against the PKK in the north of Iraqi territory, with repeated air strikes and sometimes ground battles.
"According to the information received, the Turkish Air Force bombed six PKK positions in the Karzoh Mountains," overseeing a camp of displaced Kurds in the Mahmur region, according to the statement.
There was also talk of "strikes" against "two other positions in the Sinjar Mountains and a neighboring area of Syria," as well as bombing in Iraq's Shila sector, also very close to the Syrian border.
"The bombings resulted in human casualties and property damage," the statement said.
For its part, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights yesterday referred to a "Turkish UAV strike" against a Syrian Kurdish forces position near the oil fields in Ramaylan, in the northeastern sector of war-torn Syria, without mentioning the PKK.
Northeastern Syria is in the hands of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which has repeatedly engaged in fighting with Turkish troops also present in parts of northern Syria.
In December, three Turkish soldiers were killed in an attack in northern Iraq attributed to the PKK by Ankara. In August, four Turkish soldiers were killed during operations against separatists in the region.
Also in August, at least three people were killed in a Turkish airstrike in northwestern Iraq, targeting a clinic where a wounded PKK member was believed to have been treated.
Source: Proto Thema
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