A Turkish precision strike in northern Syria took out one of the ringleaders of the PKK terrorist group's Syrian wing YPG wanted by Interpol, security sources said Wednesday.
Ali Dinçer, code-named “Orhan Bingöl,” was in charge of the PKK/YPG branch in the Jazira region of the Hassakeh governorate bordering Türkiye and was eliminated by the National Intelligence Organization (MIT) in the Qamishli region, sources said.
Dinçer, also a so-called “council” member at the PKK/YPG, joined the PKK in 1991 and went on to partake in dozens of bloody terrorist attacks, including a 2007 attack on a commando battalion in southeastern Hakkari that killed 12 soldiers and injured 18 others, as well as 2008 attacks on a gendarmerie station in Hakkari’s Şemdinli district.
Pursued by MIT for years, the terrorist also ordered an attack on a military convoy route in Hakkari’s Çukurca municipality on Aug. 7, 2015, the abduction of 10 customs officers in the city’s border to Iraq days later and all the attacks in and around Çukurca in 2015, including a rocket attack on the district governorate and gendarmerie station in October.
Dinçer began participating in the PKK’s rural operations in Türkiye’s eastern Bingöl province in 1991 before moving up the ranks to a so-called squadron chief in the Erzurum-Tunceli countryside from 1992 to 1999.
During this period he was trained personally by PKK ringleader Abdullah Öcalan in the Beqaa Valley of Lebanon.
The PKK took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984 and is designated a terrorist organization by Ankara, as well as the United States and the European Union.
After losing significant territory and countless terrorists, the group ceded to its stronghold in the Qandil Mountains in northern Iraq near the Turkish border while its Syrian branch took advantage of a power vacuum created by the Syrian civil war since 2011 and invaded several resource-rich provinces with the help of the U.S.
Washington calls the PKK/YPG its ally under the pretext of driving out Daesh, which is a source of strain with its NATO ally Ankara, who says it’s “senseless” to use one terrorist group to fight another.
In the past nine years, PKK/YPG terrorists forced many locals to migrate, bringing in their militants to change the regional demographic, seizing regional oil wells – Syria’s largest – to smuggle oil and generate revenue for its activities.
Turkish intelligence and armed forces often carry out airstrikes in Iraqi and Syrian territories on terrorist targets, with Ankara reiterating that these are meant to counter PKK/YPG efforts to establish a terror corridor along Turkish borders and not an incursion into its neighbors’ territorial integrity.
Turkish operations have been ramping up since earlier this year when PKK terrorists killed over 20 soldiers in northern Iraq. Ankara has been hinting at a fresh and “final” swoop in on the terrorist group this summer.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Tuesday said Turkish security forces eliminated a total of 1,045 terrorists during operations against the PKK over the past year.
"A total of 1,045 terrorists, seven of whom were wanted in the red category, were neutralized in operations against the PKK/KCK last year," Erdoğan said in a speech to police graduates in the capital Ankara.
He also noted that Turkish forces had "eliminated a total of 2,525 terrorists in the country's southern neighbors, with 1,473 in Syria and 1,052 in Iraq."
During counterterrorism operations, a total of "3,158 caves, shelters, hideouts and depots" used by terrorists were destroyed, the Turkish president added.
Defense Ministry on Wednesday too announced seven more PKK/YPG terrorists were eliminated in northern Syria.
Erdoğan also highlighted the country's efforts against organized crime, noting that 603 criminal groups had been dismantled by police and intelligence forces on the local, regional, national and international levels.
Highlighting Türkiye's progress in dealing with irregular migration and human trafficking over the past year, Erdoğan said: "As a result of operations, 12,500 people have been detained, including 4,500 who were arrested and sent to prison. The number of people deported has reached 149,000."
Erdoğan further noted that military operations have prevented approximately 168,000 illegal crossings at the borders and led to the capture of 13,691 irregular migrants.
He also stressed that the Turkish state would continue to pursue members of the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ), a group whose 2016 coup attempt in Türkiye was roundly defeated.
"Just last year, 5,827 operations were conducted against FETÖ, resulting in the arrest of 9,350 suspects," Erdoğan said, vowing that, "The breath of our state's institutions will continue to be on the necks of the treacherous FETÖ members, no matter where they run."
FETÖ and its U.S.-based leader Fethullah Gülen orchestrated the defeated coup of July 15, 2016, in which 252 people were killed and 2,734 wounded in Türkiye.
Gülen has long lived in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. Since the 2016 coup attempt, Turkish leaders have sought the extradition of Gülen, but U.S. officials have not approved this, saying that what Türkiye submitted falls short of the standard required.
The refusal to extradite has long been a thorn in the side of Turkish-U.S. relations.
