ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Suspected Turkish bombardment targeted Erbil’s Sidakan area on Sunday, injuring at least one, a local official told Rudaw.
Ihsan Chalabi, Sidakan’s mayor, told Rudaw’s Bakhtiyar Qadir that Turkey struck the borders of the area on Sunday afternoon, adding that a woman by the name of Sharmin Asaad, 30, was injured as a result of the attack.
Asaad’s wounds were minor and she was treated in Sidakan, the mayor added.
Turkey frequently attacks Sidakan and other areas on its southern borders with the Kurdistan Region under the pretext of targeting position of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
Designated as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the PKK is an armed group fighting for greater rights for Kurds in Turkey, with several bases in the Kurdistan Region.
In April, Turkey launched a fresh phase in a series of anti-PKK operations. The operation, dubbed Claw-Lock, is an air and ground assault that heavily focuses on mountainous border areas where the armed group maintains a presence.
The Turkish state has come under criticism from Baghdad, Erbil, and the international community for violating Iraqi sovereignty, but Ankara continues to establish increasing numbers of bases and outposts in the mountains of Erbil and Duhok provinces.
The decades-long conflict between Turkey and the PKK has left 212 villages across Erbil province abandoned, with a staggering total of 504 abandoned villages across the entire Kurdistan Region.
In addition to Turkey, Iran also regularly bombards Sidakan area, claiming to target bases of exiled Kurdish opposition groups.
At least 16 people were killed and over 50 were injured when Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) showered the skies of the Kurdistan Region’s Erbil and Sulaimani provinces with ballistic missiles and suicide drones late last month, targeting bases of Kurdish opposition groups, whom they accuse of providing arms to the protesters in the country.
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