ANKARA/SULAIMANIYA, 27 December 2007 — Turkish warplanes bombed Kurdish guerrilla targets in northern Iraq yesterday, Turkey’s general staff said, in their fourth such cross-border raid in five days.
The Turkish military said its offensive against outlawed separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) guerrillas inside Turkey and across the border in northern Iraq would continue.
“Fighter jets belonging to the Turkish armed forces successfully hit targets belonging to the terrorist organization in the early hours of Dec. 26,” the general staff said, adding eight PKK hide-outs and caves in the Zap valley were hit.
Jabbar Yawar, spokesman for the Peshmerga security forces of Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region, said the strike lasted about an hour in a mountainous border region of Dahuk province but inflicted no casualties.
In a separate incident, six PKK members were killed in clashes with troops in the Turkish border province Sirnak yesterday, the military said.
The cross-border raids are a reminder that while violence in Iraq has dropped by 60 percent since June, security is fragile and Iraq still faces threats both from within and without.
NATO-member Turkey says it has the right under international law to hit rebels who take shelter in northern Iraq and mount attacks in which they have killed dozens of Turkish troops in recent months.
Turkish aircraft also struck targets across northern Iraq on Saturday, Sunday and Tuesday, in the latest salvoes in a campaign that began with a larger bombing raid on Dec. 16. Hundreds of ground troops and long-range artillery have also been involved in the brief cross-border raids.
Hundreds of civilians have fled Iraqi villages in the border area and Iraqi Kurdish officials have said civilians were killed. Turkey has denied this. Turkey says its raids are solely aimed at PKK guerrillas.
The Turkish military said more than 150 PKK guerrillas were killed in the Dec. 16 airstrikes across northern Iraq. The strikes hit PKK command centers, training and logistics camps and more than 180 living quarters, the military said.
Iraqi Kurdish officials say the attacks targeted abandoned villages near the Turkish border and deserted mountain areas. The PKK has denied its infrastructure was destroyed or members killed.
Turkey has massed up to 100,000 troops, backed by warplanes, artillery and tanks, near its mountainous border with Iraq.
Turkey’s government authorized the military last month to launch cross-border operations following what it said were insufficient steps by Iraqi authorities against the PKK.
The Iraqi government and US forces say they support Turkey’s right to strike at the PKK but want any action to be coordinated with them and small in scale to avoid destabilizing northern Iraq.
The United States, which must tread carefully to balance its regional interests, has begun providing Turkey with intelligence on the PKK in northern Iraq after coming under pressure from Ankara for failing to crack down on the rebels.
“Everything is right on track, we are both pleased (with the intelligence sharing),” Turkish President Abdullah Gul was quoted by state news agency Anatolian as saying.
Analysts say a major Turkish land incursion is very unlikely now, since many Kurdish rebels have moved into neighboring countries and weather conditions in northern Iraq are worsening.
Ankara blames the PKK — considered a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union — for the deaths of nearly 40,000 people since it began an armed struggle for a separate Kurdish homeland in 1984.
Turkey says some 3,000 PKK members are based in camps in northern Iraq, mainly in the Qandil mountains.
