Turkish airstrikes kill one civilian, wound another in northern Erbil

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – At least one civilian was killed and another “seriously injured” in a Turkish airstrike in Bradost, Erbil province on Wednesday, local officials confirmed.

“At 6pm a Turkish jet was initially spotted overhead in the village of Zini Khalil in Bradost and it started densely bombing at 7pm,” Ahmed Khalil, the village chieftain, told Rudaw.

Bradost is located 70 kilometers northeast of Erbil city.

The two brothers were travelling in a vehicle when they were caught in the airstrike, Khalil said. Mansour Nafih, 25, was killed, and Pashew Nafih, 20, was wounded.

Adnan Ghafour, the physician on duty at the Ashti Hospital in Bradost said Nafih had sustained “serious injures”.

“After treating him with emergency first aid, we refereed him to West Erbil Emergency Hospital,” Ghafour told Rudaw English.

The Turkish defense ministry confirmed late on Wednesday that its warplanes had targeted Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) positions in Zap and Khakurk, “neutralizing two terrorists”. 

In a statement late on Wednesday, the Peoples’ Defense Forces (HPG), the armed wing of the PKK, said the bombardment took place at 7.30 pm local time, but added: “Nothing happened to our forces.”

Rudaw cannot independently verify the claims.

According to Roj News, which is closely aligned with the PKK, the two men were tourists from the Choman area.

Wednesday’s airstrikes come just three days after Turkey targeted the mountainous areas of Zakho, Duhok province.

Turkey regularly carries out airstrikes and ground operations against suspected PKK positions inside the Kurdistan Region.

Turkey launched ‘Operation Claw’ in late May targeting PKK positions in northern Erbil.

The PKK is an armed group fighting for greater political and cultural rights for Kurds in Turkey. It has been at war with the Turkish state since the 1980s.

The guerrilla group is headquartered in the mountains of Qandil in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq near the border with Turkey and Iran.

Civilians are routinely caught in the crossfire. Villagers in Duhok stormed a Turkish air force outpost in January after airstrikes killed six civilians.

Both Erbil and Baghdad have called on Ankara to halt its attacks and have demanded the PKK withdraw from their territory.

Iraqi President Barham Salih “stressed the need to safeguard Iraqi sovereignty and rejected any unilateral military action beyond Iraq’s borders,” when he met with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Istanbul in May. 

At least 4,356 people have been killed in the conflict since July 20, 2015 when the latest attempt at peace talks collapsed, according to the International Crisis Group (ICG). 

With reporting from Bakhtyar Qadir and Zhelwan Z. Wali