ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Turkey has carried its latest military offensive in the Kurdistan Region pursuing suspected Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) targets into an eleventh day, a local official told Rudaw English on Friday.
“Around 10:00 am this morning the Turkish warplanes bombarded Khamtir Mountain in Zakho,” Zeravan Musa, Darkar district head of Duhok province’s Zakho told Rudaw English on Friday.
According to Musa, the aerial bombardment was followed by ground clashes between Turkish troops and PKK fighters in the area, which “lasted for a while before it all calmed down.”
Zakho is a district on the Iraqi-Turkish border in the northern Duhok province of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
According to Rudaw’s reporter in Zakho, Yousif Musa, Turkish warplanes are still fervently patrolling the area’s sky.
Ankara launched its air campaign Operation Claw-Eagle against suspected PKK positions in the Kurdistan Region and the disputed territories on June 15. Its air forces have since hit scores of targets in the Kurdistan Region, says the Turkish defence ministry. These include in the areas of Haftanin, Zap, Gara, Avasin-Basyan, Qandil and Khakurk, as well as the disputed towns of Shingal and Makhmour, both home to significant populations of refugees and the internally displaced.
Two days later, Turkey launched the ground-based Operation Claw-Tiger in Haftanin, involving the airdrop of commando force members into the Haftanin area of Duhok province. A further dispatch of Turkish commandos into the Kurdistan Region was made on June 21.
Turkish airstrikes killed at least five civilians in Duhok and Erbil provinces in two days beginning June 18. Ankara has announced the deaths of several PKK fighters, as well as two of its own soldiers. The PKK has not acknowledged Ankara-claimed casualties of its own fighters, but purports to have killed several Turkish soldiers and downed at least two helicopters.
However, in an official statement, the Turkish defense ministry claimed that they have never targeted civilians, and only target “terrorists.”
“As it has been the case before, no civilian has been harmed or will be harmed in this operation,” a Turkish defense ministry statement released Friday claims.
Iran and Turkey appear to have coordinated recent artillery and bombing campaigns in the border areas of the Kurdistan region of Iraq, with the reported aim of targeting the Kurdish forces.
Iraqi President Barham Salih called on Ankara to end the Turkish military operation and airstrikes that violate the national sovereignty of Iraq.
“The Presidency of the Republic of Iraq calls for an end to the violations that affect national sovereignty as a result of the repeated Turkish military operations and its violation of Iraqi airspace, which killed a number of unarmed civilians,” Iraqi presidency tweeted on Friday.
Barham Salih stressed the need to solve the border issues and security between Iraq and Turkey through “cooperation and coordination”.
An unknown warplane conducted an airstrike targeting Kuna Masi tourist resort in northeastern Sulaimani province on Thursday, killing at least one unidentified fighter, and wounding six civilians.
