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Iraq fears clash between Turkish troops
and Kurdistan's Peshmerga forces
25.2.2008
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February 25, 2008
Baghdad, Iraq, -- Iraq fears that a prolonged
Turkish incursion into northern Iraq could trigger
clashes between Turkish troops and Iraqi Kurdish
Peshmerga security forces, the country's national
security adviser said on Monday.
Mowaffaq al-Rubaie said such fighting could have
"very serious consequences" for a part of Iraq that
has been relatively stable compared with the rest of
the country.
Ankara launched a ground
incursion on Thursday in a remote
part of Iraq's largely autonomous region of
Kurdistan to hunt down Turkey's Kurdish PKK rebels.
It accuses the PKK of using the area as a base to
stage deadly attacks inside Turkey. |
Mowaffaq al-Rubaie, Iraq's national security adviser |
"The ... longer Turkish soldiers stay inside Iraqi
territory, the more likely this is going to happen,"
Rubaie told reporters in Baghdad when asked if he
was concerned about clashes between Turkish and
Iraqi Kurdistan Peshmerga forces breaking out.
"We need to avoid this at any cost. This has very
serious consequences even if this happens by
accident."
A Kurdish security official said Turkish troops and
Turkish-Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) rebels clashed
during the night in the Amadiya area,www.ekurd.net
10 km (6 miles) south of
the border, but added he did not know if there had
been any fighting on Monday.
He said the Turkish military shelled PKK targets on
Monday, after launching several air strikes
overnight.
So far the battle-hardened Peshmerga have stayed on
the sidelines of the Turkish military operation,www.ekurd.net
which is taking place in
a sparsely populated mountainous region. Kurdish
officials regard the area as outside their control.
While Iraqi Kurds have little sympathy for the aims
of the PKK, there is widespread anger over the
incursion.
The leadership of Iraqi Kurdistan has said any
targeting of Kurdish civilians would result in
"massive resistance" by its Peshmerga forces, which
have been put on a state of alert.
Turkey says it is carrying out a limited operation
against the PKK, which it blames for the deaths of
nearly 40,000 people since it began its armed
struggle in 1984. The PKK has been battling to
create a Kurdish homeland in southeast Turkey.
U.S. officials say Ankara has given assurances it
will do all it can to avoid civilian casualties in
Kurdistan 'northern Iraq'.
There have been no reports of civilian casualties,
but residents in villages near the border say they
are being targeted in Turkish air strikes and
artillery barrages.
In a worrying sign, Turkish ground troops have come
face to face with Iraq's Kurdistan Peshmerga forces
twice in recent days.
In one incident, a senior Iraqi Kurdish official
said
Peshmerga soldiers stopped
Turkish tanks from leaving a base
just inside Kurdistan 'northern Iraq'. Turkey has
kept small contingents of troops in northern Iraq
since earlier offensives in the 1990s.
Iraq's government said on Sunday Turkey should
withdraw its troops as soon as possible and urged
Ankara to sit down with Baghdad for talks to resolve
the crisis over the PKK. It said Turkey was sending
a special envoy to Baghdad on Wednesday.
Iraq has repeatedly called for a diplomatic solution
to the PKK presence, saying it has taken some
measures to deal with the rebels but is more focused
on trying to stabilize the rest of the country.
Ankara says it has the right under international law
to hunt and kill members of the PKK.
Iraqi Kurdistan politician says, Turkey is using
Turkey's Kurdish separatist PKK rebel group as an
excuse to invade Kurdistan region 'Iraq' to prevent
the establishment of Kurdistan state in the Kurdish
autonomous region in 'northern Iraq', Turkey fears
this could fan separatism among its own large
Kurdish population in southeast Turkey.
"Turkey's goal is not only the PKK but the whole
idea of an autonomous Kurdistan region," Massoud
Barzani, the President of Kurdistan said earlier.
Analysts believe the Turkish raids inside Iraqi
Kurdistan region had a secondary purpose of
discouraging a referendum on Kirkuk city. Ankara
fears that if the oil-rich Kirkuk joins Kurdistan,
the Kurds will have the economic foundation they
need for an independent state.
Turkey rejects direct talks with Iraqi Kurdistan
government, Officially, Turkey does not recognise
the regional government of Kurdistan led by
president Massoud Barzani.
Turkey has never, and still does not, recognize the
Kurdistan region government (KRG) and refuses to
meet with its representatives in any official
capacity. That reflects Ankara's fear that any
international respect shown to the autonomous Iraqi
Kurdistan region would only embolden Turkey's own
large Kurdish minority to seek similar home-rule
status.
Over 39,000 Turkish soldiers and Kurdish PKK
guerrillas have been killed since 1984 when the PKK
took up arms for self-rule in the country's mainly
Kurdish southeast of Turkey. A large Turkey's
Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish
PKK rebels.
The PKK demanded Turkey's recognition of the Kurds'
identity in its constitution and of their language
as a native language along with Turkish in the
country's Kurdish areas, the party also demanded
an end to ethnic discrimination in Turkish laws and
constitution against Kurds, ranting them full
political freedoms.
The PKK is considered a terrorist organization by
the U.S. and the EU.
Reuters | Agencies
**
Kurds are not recognized as an official minority in
Turkey and are denied rights granted to other
minority groups. Under EU pressure, Turkey recently
granted Kurds limited rights for broadcasts and
education in the Kurdish language, but critics say
the measures do not go far enough.
The use of the term "Kurdistan" is vigorously
rejected due to its alleged political implications
by the Republic of Turkey, which does not recognize
the existence of a "Turkish Kurdistan" Southeast
Turkey.
Others estimate over 40 million Kurds live in
Big Kurdistan (Iraq, Turkey, Syria, Iran, Armenia),
which covers an area as big as France, about half of
all Kurds which estimate to 20 million live in
Turkey.
Turkey is home to over 25 million ethnic Kurds, a
large Turkey's Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK for a
Kurdish homeland in the country's mainly Kurdish
southeast of Turkey.
Before August 2002, the Turkish government placed
severe restrictions on the use of Kurdish language,
prohibiting the language in education and broadcast
media.
The Kurdish alphabet is still not recognized
in Turkey, and use of the Kurdish letters X, W, Q
which do not exist in the Turkish
alphabet has led to judicial persecution in 2000 and
2003
The Kurdish flag flown officially in Iraqi Kurdistan
but unofficially flown by Kurds in Armenia. The flag
is banned in Iran, Syria, and Turkey where flying it
is a criminal offence"
Southeastern Turkey:
North Kurdistan (
Kurdistan-Turkey)
wikipedia
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