Various areas across the northern Iraqi Kurdistan region have witnessed an escalation in Turkey’s ongoing strikes against alleged targets belonging to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) terrorist group.
On Sunday, four people were killed in “a Turkish airstrike on a vehicle” in the Sulaymaniyah’s Province’s Halsho area in Kurdistan, Kurdish-language television Rudaw reported, citing local mayor Bakr Waisy.
The mayor identified the exact whereabouts of the attack as the stretch of land lying between the villages of Kani Lan and Dega.
The vehicle contained 3 PKK militia members and an Iraqi Kurdish driver. PKK has not released any statements on the incident yet.
The Dohuk Province’s Amedi District also saw intense clashes between the Turkish military and the PKK, the channel added, saying Turkish helicopter gunships were bombing a village in the district.
Turkey has been using the presence of the anti-Ankara outfit as an excuse to seek year-long mandates from Iraq to pound Kurdistan’s Qandil mountains.
Since last year, it has, however, egregiously overstepped its mandate and stretched the theater of its war on the group to areas lying deep in the Kurdistan region.
Earlier this month, Chairman of the Security and Defense Committee in the Iraqi Parliament, Mohammed Rida Al Haidar denounced the Turkish military presence there as “occupation.”
Though Turkey itself claimed to want to establish a secure border at 30km depth into Kurdistan, the attack of sunday took place in a village quite near the border of Iran, at 122 km distance of the Turkish border.
Clashes between PKK and Turkish army continued through the night in Hirur, north-Duhok province.
