Dec 24, 2023 at 5:42 PM Update: 4 minutes ago
Since Friday, twelve Turkish soldiers have been killed in fighting with the Kurdish PKK in northern Iraq. The Turkish Air Force has carried out retaliatory strikes on targets in Syria and northern Iraq.
The Turkish soldiers were killed in fighting in Zap and Hakurk in the mountainous border region in northern Iraq. The fighting is part of a ground operation that started in April 2022. The Turkish army has been regularly conducting operations against the PKK in northern Iraq for more than thirty years.
The Turkish Air Force has carried out several retaliatory strikes since Saturday evening. 29 targets were destroyed in northern Iraq and Syria, the Ministry of Defense said. At least thirty PKK fighters have been eliminated since Friday, Defense Minister Yasar Güler reports. Earlier on Sunday, the minister visited the border area between Turkey and Iraq with the army leadership.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has now offered his condolences to the relatives of the killed soldiers. “The blood of our soldiers has been wasted, the separatist thugs will be held accountable for the blood they shed,” Erdogan said. “We will continue with a vengeance on our strategy to root out terrorism.”
Turkey has been in conflict with the PKK for almost forty years. Like the United States and the European Union, Ankara considers the Kurdish movement a terrorist organization.
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Turkey, Romania and Bulgaria will defuse mines in the Black Sea
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Turkey carries out dozens of retaliatory attacks on PKK targets in Iraq
Beeld: Getty Images
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2023-12-24 16:42:23
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