US condemns death of Turkish citizens by PKK if 'confirmed': statement

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — The US on Monday said it condemns the death of Turkish citizens in the Kurdistan Region, following an operation against the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), if reports of their death at the hands of the PKK are confirmed, it said in a statement published by the state department.

“If reports of the death of Turkish civilians at the hands of the PKK, a designated terrorist organization, are confirmed, we condemn this action in the strongest possible terms,” it said.

It also expressed condolences to the families “of those lost in the recent fighting."

"We stand with our NATO ally Turkey," it added.

Turkey's foreign ministry has summoned the US envoy in response to the statement.

Turkey launched Operation Claw-Eagle 2, a ground and air operation against the PKK, an armed group fighting for increased rights for Turkey’s Kurdish minority, on February 10 on Duhok’s Mount Gara.

It followed Operation Claw-Eagle, an aerial bombardment campaign launched in June 2020, which targeted various areas in the Kurdistan Region and territory disputed between Erbil and Baghdad. Several civilians were killed and injured in the offensive. 

The US embassy in Ankara previously said that it was “saddened” by the death of three Turkish soldiers during the operation.

Despite their disagreements over the issue of Kurds in northeast Syria (Rojava), the US, like many of Turkey’s allies, officially considers the PKK  to be a terrorist organization.

The Turkish Ministry of Defense announced on Sunday that it had ended the operation and found the bodies of 13 Turkish nationals held hostage by the PKK, claiming 12 were shot in the head and one in the shoulder.

The PKK, however, claimed the 13 were killed in Turkey’s bombing campaign and said that the deceased, said to be members of Turkey’s police, intelligence and armed forces, had been held as hostages since 2015.  

According to the Turkish defense ministry, three of their soldiers were killed and three were injured during the four-day operation. They also claimed to have killed 48 PKK fighters, including three senior leaders, and captured two alive. 

Fifty shelters, headquarters, and depots were “successfully destroyed” in the operation, it added.

The Turkish army intensely bombarded several villages in Akre’s Dinarte on Friday, according to Dinarte mayor Shaaban Barwari.

The PKK on Thursday claimed to have killed “at least nine Turkish soldiers,” including a captain and a sergeant. They did not immediately release their own casualty figures but said Turkey had inflated the numbers.