The Iraqi parliamentary meeting on Saturday discussed the latest Turkish artillery shelling of a Zakho resort that killed nine Iraqi tourists and wounded 23 more.
“In today’s parliamentary meeting, the defense ministry read a report about the Turkish attacks and military proceedings into Iraqi land, and according to the report, the Turkish military has set up over a hundred military outposts and five bases in the Kurdistan Region and Iraq,” MP Sherwan Dubardani told Rudaw.
Dubardani added that the report indicated that the Turkish military has entered 105 kilometers deep into Iraqi lands and has over 4,000 soldiers inside the country.
Turkey launched its latest operation dubbed Operation Claw-Lock on April 18 targeting Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) hideouts in the mountainous areas of Metina, Zap, Avashin, and Basyan in Duhok province. The operation is the fourth stage of Ankara’s Claw operations against the PKK in the Kurdistan Region, with the first stage starting in 2019.
The PKK is an armed group fighting for the increased rights of Kurds in Turkey and designated a terrorist organization by Ankara.
Despite Ankara's denial, the assaults have previously led to civilian casualties who are often caught in the crossfire in the Region.
The parliamentary meeting on Saturday comes after a shelling in Zakho, Duhok province killed nine Arab tourists and injured 22 others from Iraq’s central and southern provinces. Baghdad and Erbil have blamed the Turkish army for the deadly attack while Ankara denied its involvement.
Iraqis have strongly condemned the Zakho attack through protests, attacks on Turkish embassy in Baghdad and Turkish visa application centres, calls to boycott Turkish products and anti-Turkey hashtags on social media.
“According to the report, the shelling was carried out using 155mm artillery shells, which cannot be moved a lot in mountainous areas,” Dubardani said, adding that according to the defense ministry, the direction of the shelling came from an area under the control of Turkish military.
Iraqi protesters on Thursday called for the expulsion of Turkish ambassador Ali Riza Guney from the country. The Iraqi foreign ministry said later in the day that it had summoned Guney and handed him a “strongly worded” protest letter.
The Iraqi government on Wednesday called on Turkey to withdraw all troops from the country. The government has also said it will take diplomatic measures against Ankara, including filing a complaint at the United Nations Security Council.
The deadly attack has been locally and globally condemned but most countries have avoided explicitly blaming Turkey or the PKK.
