ANKARA, Turkey – Turkey said it sent ground forces into northern Iraq on Tuesday for the first time in two years, killing up to 40 rebels of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
“Two Special Forces units consisting of 230 troops crossed into northern Iraq as F-4 and F-16 jets targeted six PKK bases in the area,” Turkey’s official Anadolu Agency reported, quoting an unidentified military source.
“Initial reports suggested up to 40 PKK terrorists were killed in the operation,” the agency said.
“The incursion was believed to be a short-term measure to track down those involved in an attack in Hakkari province on Sunday that saw 16 soldiers martyred in a roadside bombing,” AA said.
On Tuesday, another PKK attack killed 13 police officers in Igdir province, it reported.
There was no immediate reaction from the Iraqi government in Baghdad or from the autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in the north. The PKK operates military camps in the Qandil mountains of the Kurdistan region.
This is the first time Turkey has sent troops into northern Iraq since 2013, when Ankara and the PKK began a peace process to end a three-decade conflict in which more than 40,000 people have been killed.
Those negotiations were shattered in July, after the PKK claimed responsibility for killing two Turkish soldiers and Ankara launched a string of air and artillery attacks on the PKK in the Kurdistan region of northern Iraq and in its own Kurdish southeast.
The PKK, which is considered a terrorist group by Turkey, the United States and the European Union, has been harshly persecuted by Ankara, which has stood against full rights for its large Kurdish population of some 15 million people.
