Turkish airstrikes have eliminated in total 21 targets belonging to the PKK terrorists in northern Iraq, the Defense Ministry said Monday.
Turkish jets struck the PKK hideouts, shelters, caves, storage areas and other facilities used by the terrorists in Metina, Gara, Hakurk and Qandil regions of Iraq, close to the Turkish border, the ministry said.
Using domestically made ammunition, the jets eliminated many terrorists, the ministry said, without specifying a number or the identities of the terrorists.
All precautions were taken to prevent any damage to innocent civilians, cultural and historical heritage and the environment, the ministry added.
In its nearly 40-year terror campaign against Türkiye, the PKK – listed as a terrorist organization by Türkiye, the U.S. and the EU – has been responsible for the deaths of more than 40,000 people, including women, children and infants.
The conflict with the PKK was long fought mainly in rural areas of southeastern Türkiye but is now more focused on the mountains of northern Iraq's semi-autonomous Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG)-administered region, where the PKK militants have their headquarters in Qandil.
Türkiye has since 2019 conducted a series of cross-border operations in northern Iraq against the PKK, dubbed "Claw." Defense Minister Yaşar Güler said recently that the ongoing Operation Claw-Lock, launched in April 2022, would be completed before the winter to sever the ties between Syria and Qandil.
The aim is to wipe out the PKK from the immediate Turkish borders and create an approximately 40-kilometer-deep security corridor along the Iraqi and Syrian borders.
Both Turkish intelligence and the Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) have since ramped up strikes on the “terror corridor” in the region, indicating a wider offensive may already be underway.
The PKK is not recognized as a terrorist group in Iraq but is banned from launching attacks on Türkiye from Iraqi soil.
Ankara and Baghdad have been at loggerheads over Ankara's cross-border military operations against the PKK in northern Iraq.
Iraq has said the operations are a violation of its sovereignty, but Ankara says they are needed to protect itself.
Baghdad in March outlawed the PKK and agreed in August to a military cooperation that will see joint training and command centers against the terrorists but Ankara wants Iraq to fully recognize it as a terrorist organization.
The PKK relies on support from a party operating in the KRG-controlled region in Iraq as Baghdad and the KRG has tightened measures against the group, including a ban by Baghdad. In Syria, it boasts support from the United States, under the pretext of fighting against Daesh.
