Warning: Undefined array key "rbname" in /data/rantburg.com/www/pgrecentorg.php on line 14
Hello !

Iraq

Iraqi Kurds wary of PKK fighters from Turkey

2013-05-12

Iraqi Kurds living near the border are wary of thousands of Kurdish fighters leaving Turkey for northern Iraq, and hope the move does not lead to more Turkish air and artillery strikes. For years, Turkey’s military has targeted fighters from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party in Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region, keeping farmers from their land and sometimes killing and wounding civilians. The PKK, which has fought a 29-year nationalist campaign against Ankara, is now withdrawing its fighters into Iraq, where it already has bases, as part of a peace drive with Turkey. While it is a positive sign for peace prospects, the movement of some 2,000 additional PKK fighters into Iraq has not put residents at ease. “We hope not to hear the sounds of Turkish artillery and airplanes bombarding our mountains again,” said Mohammad Saeed, 47, a resident of the town of Al-Amadia, near the border with Turkey. “We are afraid that the fighting will start again,” Saeed said.

Link

Syria-Lebanon-Iran

Syria air raids target Aleppo Kurds

2013-04-07

Syrian warplanes Saturday raided a flashpoint majority Kurdish district in the northern city of Aleppo, a watchdog said, while air strikes were also reported on the outskirts of Damascus. “A warplane raided the west of Sheikh Maqsud in Aleppo city, killing at least five civilians and wounding several others,” said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, as violence in the politically sensitive neighbourhood escalated. The area targeted by the air strike is under control of the Democratic Union Party (PYD), Syria’s branch of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), Abdel Rahman told AFP. “We can see a clear drive by the army to attack the Kurds in recent days. The PYD is being dragged by the army into Syria’s conflict,” he said. Up until now, Syria’s Kurds have been split over Syria’s bloody revolt, with most trying to maintain neutrality. Amateur video shot in the neighbourhood and distributed by the Syrian Revolution General Commission, a grassroots network of activists, showed burnt bodies lying in rubble. The footage was reportedly filmed in the strike’s aftermath. Elsewhere, the air force targeted Al-Hajar al-Aswad in southern Damascus and Qadam in the southwest, said the Britain-based watchdog. Al-Hajar al-Aswad was also struck by mortar rounds and rockets, activists in the capital said. Warplanes also raided Yabrud near Damascus and Qusayr in the central province of Homs, as regime tanks shelled rebel enclaves in Homs city. In Damascus, mortar rounds hit Baramkeh in the heart of the city, said the Observatory, as rebels pressed their campaign to break into the regime’s key bastion.

Link

The Grand Turk

Freedom of expression in Turkey ‘under attack’

2013-03-28

Amnesty International criticised Wednesday European Union hopeful Turkey’s dismal record on freedom of expression and called for legislative reforms to bring “abuses to an end.” “Freedom of expression is under attack in Turkey,” the London-based group said. “Hundreds of abusive criminal prosecutions are brought every year against political activists, human rights defenders, journalists, lawyers and others,” it added. “These prosecutions represent one of the most deeply entrenched human rights problems in Turkey today.” Turkey is under fire from rights groups for its escalating crackdown especially on the media, with critics saying its draconian laws are putting a record number of journalists behind bars. The country is the leading jailer of journalists worldwide, imprisoning even more than China or Iran, according to an October report by the US-based Committee to Protect Journalists. The committee identified 76 journalists imprisoned in Turkey as of August 1, including 61 who were put behind bars purely because of their journalism. But the government of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan vehemently denies the charges, insisting no one has been jailed because of their profession but rather because of links with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Sounds mighty convenient, though... Amnesty said despite progress in Turkey in discussing taboo subjects more freely such as the criticism of the once-powerful army, problems still remain in expressing “dissenting opinions” on controversial issues, most notably the Kurdish problem. Erdogan this month criticised editors of the liberal Milliyet newspaper which published the details of a meeting between jailed Kurdish rebel leader Abdullah Ocalan and pro-Kurdish lawmakers in his island prison cell as part of a new peace push to end the three decades of hostilities. “If this is journalism, then let it be damned,” Erdogan said. Funny how the NYT never publishes leaks from the Ankara government. I guess they figure Milliyet can handle it... Critics accuse Erdogan’s government of using courts to silence dissenting voices, saying the large number of court cases have resulted in weak news coverage of the trials. Amnesty said in order to prevent “these abuses from continuing,” Turkey must overhaul its laws to improve freedom of expression. On Monday, Human Rights Watch also called for a legal reform which it said would help bolster the peace process between Turkey and the PKK, which is branded a terrorist organisation by Ankara and much of the international community.

Link

Europe

Paris murder suspect 'has no links with PKK'

2013-01-22

Doubts emerged today about the background and motives of a man accused of the murder of three Kurdish separatists in Paris two weeks ago. French police believe that the murder could have been provoked by internal rivalries within the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which is fighting for a separate Kurdish state in south eastern Turkey. But the uncle of the suspect and Kurdish leaders said today that Omer Guney, 31, was not a Kurd and had no direct connection with the PKK. Kurdish separatists claimed that Mr Guney, who was acting as driver for one of the dead women, might have been a mole working for an extreme Turkish nationalist group. Mr Guney’s uncle, Zekai Guney, said: “Neither he, nor any of us, have the slightest sympathy for (the PKK) My nephew is sick, He has a tumour on the brain. He can’t remember what he is doing from one hour to the next,” he told the Turkish language version of CNN. Turkish community leaders in the Paris said that Mr Guney had joined one of their associations over a year ago. They said that he was ethnically Turkish, not Kurdish, and had no connection with the PKK. Mr Guney was formally accused on Monday of “murder in association with a terrorist organisation”. French investigators say that he may not have been the only person involved but there is “no shadow of doubt” that he was involved.

Link

The Grand Turk

Seven Turkish troops killed in Kurdish rebel attack

2012-09-19

DIYARBAKIR, Turkey: Seven Turkish troops were killed and almost 60 others were wounded yesterday in a rocket assault on their military convoy in Turkey’s southeast, according to local security sources. The military convoy was hit by Kurdish rebel rockets on the highway on the outskirts of southeastern Bingol province, sparking a fire that wounded 58 soldiers aboard an army bus. The number of dead soldiers was initially announced at four and the wounded at 48 by the local governor. Dozens of wounded soldiers are being treated at nearby hospitals and the death toll may still rise, according to the sources. The Turkish army retaliated with an immediate operation backed by air power in the larger Bingol area to capture the members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) who staged the attack, Anatolia news agency reported. The assailants are identified by witnesses as three men who drove away in a car after the attack, and they are believed to be traveling with heavy explosives on board, NTV private news channel reported. PKK attacks against Turkish security forces have become almost daily events in the Kurdish-majority southeast, but a powerful rocket ambush carried out in daylight marks a rare incident.

Link

The Grand Turk

30 dead as Kurdish rebels clash with Turkish forces

2012-09-04

Kurdish rebels wielding rocket launchers and machine-guns attacked a security base in southeast Turkey, triggering a firefight that left 30 people dead, local officials said Monday. Ten soldiers were killed and seven wounded in the attack in the province of Sirnak, the local government said, while other sources said about 20 members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) were also killed. Provincial governor Vahdettin Ozkan said the militants had attacked the security complex at Beytussebap, which lies about 40 kilometres (25 miles) from the Iraqi border, late Sunday. Police and soldiers returned fire, triggering some of the deadliest clashes with the rebels seen in months. ‘The fight against terrorism will continue in all its aspects,’ Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag said in televised remarks. In another incident in the southeast late Sunday, clashes erupted when rebels refused to heed police calls to stop at a checkpoint on a highway in the province of Sanliurfa and instead shot at police, NTV television reported. Three members of the security forces and one civilian were wounded, along with one Kurdish rebel in the fighting in the province which borders Syria, according to the private television station. Rebels in the vehicle attempted to run away flee the scene but were blocked by security forces, and one left the car and blew himself up, NTV said. It said police had received tip-offs that Kurdish suicide bombers had infiltrated from neighbouring Syria for attacks inside Turkey. Suggesting that the Syrian Kurds are allowing the PKK to use their territory as sanctuary. That's gonna upset the Turks no end...

Link

The Grand Turk

Turkey seeks to end Kurdish conflict

2011-11-28

ANKARA: For a quarter century, defeating the Kurdish insurgency has been a pillar of Turkish state policy. Now, that’s being called into question as the government takes stock of the fight’s cost and its role in hampering Turkey’s ambitions for regional leadership. The struggle against the Kurdish guerrilla organization, marking the 33rd anniversary of its foundation Sunday, has claimed tens of thousands of lives and cost Turkey hundreds of billions of dollars. Turkey has superior firepower and now US-supplied drones to fight the rebels, but there’s no clear path to victory. The government recently left the door open for future dialogue with the rebels while vowing to fight to maintain its military drive until they lay down arms. “We say it very clearly: We will struggle against terrorism until the end, but we will also negotiate with those who prefer politics,” Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said late September. “Those who prefer politics can talk to us, others can’t.” Analysts said the two-pronged message appeared aimed at keeping pressure on the Kurds while encouraging them to reach a political solution to the conflict. In another gesture, Erdogan apologized Wednesday for the first time for the killings of nearly 14,000 people in a bombing and strafing campaign to crush a Kurdish rebellion in the southeastern town of Dersim — now known as Tunceli — between 1936 and 1939. While the apology was less a policy shift than a political tactic to tarnish the reputation of the opposition party, which was in power at that time, it still signaled a softening of lines toward the Kurds. Turkey’s Islam-based government, praised for apparent economic stability since coming to power 2002, believes a solution to the Kurdish conflict would enable the country to transfer its energy and resources to development, and eventually make it a more powerful actor in the Middle East. “God willing, Turkey will fly when we solve this terrorism problem and traitors’ actions that we see as the biggest obstacle blocking Turkey path are ended,” Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc said Friday. The government has recently admitted to holding secret talks with the rebels of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party or PKK last year but it was not clear whether the sides were again conferring amid an intensified fight that has killed dozens of rebels and Turkish soldiers since this summer. Erdogan said this week that he “fully supports” the arrests of hundreds of alleged PKK supporters, including more than 40 Kurdish lawyers — who are accused of relaying orders from imprisoned rebel chief Abdullah Ocalan and running their own courts in a separate power structure. Kurdish lawmakers said the government was waging a campaign of intimidation. The rebels and the country’s Kurdish political movement insist on autonomy and Kurdish education in schools, which Turkey fears could divide the country along ethnic lines. The conflict has forced Turkey to acquire drones from Israel and the United States and develop armored personnel carriers that can withstand roadside bomb attacks by the rebels, who also resort to suicide and car bombings. The drones have enabled the military to stage pinpoint attacks against the elusive rebels, who often vanish into the mountains of the southeast or return to their bases across the border in Iraq. Henri J. Barkey, a Turkey expert at Lehigh University in the United States, said that Erdogan’s political and military strategy was aimed at putting pressure on the PKK and the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party to return to official talks. “This is possibly what he is trying to do in order to restart negotiations,” Barkey said in an e-mail. “Similarly, the PKK has been flexing its muscle to show that it can hurt the government.” “The government has moved quite far by having secret talks with the PKK, there cannot be a return from this,” he said. But he cautioned that the current government strategy is a delicate one and can go awry. “A miscalculation could undermine everything because you are using violence and negotiations at the same time,” said Barkey. “Very tricky.”

Link

The Grand Turk

PKK suspected in deadly blast

2011-10-19

ANKARA: A land mine explosion killed five police officers and three civilians in Turkey on Tuesday, in an attack that security sources blamed on Kurdish terrorists rebels. The mine, planted on a rural road in a village near the Guroymak district of Bitlis province in the mainly Kurdish southeast, was detonated by remote control as a police car was passing by, the Anatolia news agency quoted governor Nurettin Yilmaz as saying. The death toll rose to eight when one of the four who were injured died at a hospital, the governor told the agency. A two-year-old girl was among the dead. The remaining three who were injured were at the intensive care unit, said the governor. Security forces combed the area in search of the terrorists assailants, believed to be members of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). The terrorists rebels have lately intensified their attacks in a war for autonomy in the country’s Kurdish-dominated southeast, killing dozens of members of the country’s security force and at least 17 civilians since mid-July. Land mine attacks by suspected PKK terrorists guerrillas have become common in Turkey’s eastern and southeastern provinces.

Link

The Grand Turk

Kurd rebels blow up Iran-Turkey gas pipeline

2010-07-22

ANKARA — Suspected Kurdish rebels blew up a pipeline carrying natural gas from Iran to Turkey, forcing the shutdown of the conduit, officials said Wednesday. The powerful blast occurred overnight at a section of the pipeline near the eastern Turkish town of Dogubayazit, in Agri province, several kilometres (miles) from the Iranian border, a local official told AFP by telephone, without giving other details. “The explosion is believed to have been carried out by members of the separatist terrorist organisation,” Agri Governor Ali Yerlikaya said in a statement, referring to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK). Security forces were looking for the perpetrators, said the statement, carried by Anatolia news agency. Television footage showed a large blaze raging over the pipeline after the blast which Anatolia said shattered the windows of nearby buildings. The explosion cut the flow of Iranian gas, but an official at Turkey’s state oil and gas company BOTAS ruled out a supply shortage, saying that gas coming via pipelines from Russia and Azerbaijan was meeting the needs. “There is no problem at the moment,” she told AFP. Repairs at the damaged section of the Iranian conduit were expected to take about a week, she said, adding that the fire had been extinguished by Wednesday. Russian energy giant Gazprom said Wednesday that it was increasing supplies to make up for the shortfall. Gazprom has increased its deliveries from 14 million cubic metres per day to 22 million cubic metres, the statement said.

Link

Iraq

Barzani says Kurdistan nation should have its own state

2010-07-17

BAGHDAD / Aswat al-Iraq: President of Iraq’s Kurdistan region said that the Kurdistan nation should have its own state like the Turkish, Persian and Arab nations, according to the Hürriyet Daily News. Oh boy. Try to keep this quiet a while longer, huh guys ... As it works to deepen its relationship with northern Iraq, the Turkish Foreign Ministry has said its approach toward Iraq’s territorial integrity remains unchanged despite the Iraqi Kurdish leader’s reported desire to found a Kurdish state. “I am against the use of violence, but the Kurdish nation, as its legitimate right, should have its own state like the Turkish, Persian　and Arab nations,” Iraqi Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani told an Egyptian television broadcaster, daily Milliyet reported Thursday. “We are not claiming we are stronger than them, but we have nothing less than those nations.” Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Burak Özügergin told the Hürriyet Daily News & Economic Review that Turkey’s approach toward Iraq remains unchanged. “I haven’t heard the statements made by Mr. Barzani, but there has been no change in Ankara’s views or attitude toward Iraq’s territorial integrity,” Özügergin told the Daily News on Thursday. Turkey has repeatedly stressed its commitment to Iraq’s territorial integrity and political unity while at the same time working to improve its relationship with the Iraqi Kurdish leadership in the north in recent years. Ankara, however, continues to criticize Barzani for not doing enough to help Turkey fight the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK. Despite the disagreements over the fight against the PKK, the status of the oil-rich northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk and the sharing of oil revenues, Barzani’s visit to Turkey last month was deemed an important development for regional balance, especially amid the Obama administration’s plans to pull out troops from Iraq.

Link

Iraq

Iraq is not Turkish cop – spokesman

2010-07-01

BAGHDAD / Aswat al-Iraq: Iraq’s role in the joint security committee with Turkey and the U.S. is finding the appropriate mechanism to deal with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), a spokesman of the Iraqi government said, underlining that Iraq does not work as a policeman for the Turkish government. “The intelligence cooperation between the three countries still underway,” Ali al-Dabbagh told Aswat al-Iraq news agency, considering such cooperation as not enough. This is the first official comment from the Iraqi side on the Turkish government, which considered the intelligence information provided by the Iraqi and American sides on the PKK movements as not enough. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan had called on the U.S. to help Turkey in its war against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) by providing the Turkish military with than just “intelligence sharing.” Sorry, we hate terrorists as much as you, but you've been upsetting us lately ... Erdogan made his remarks early Monday during a press conference in Toronto, where he attended the G-20 summit over the weekend and met separately with U.S. President Barack Obama. According to the Turkish leader, an anti-terror mechanism set up between Turkey, Iraq and the United States should include functions other than “intelligence sharing.” Erdogan said he discussed this issue in talks with Obama.

Link

Iraq

PKK guerrillas attacked by Turkish warplanes in Iraq

2008-04-17

Turkish warplanes fired on a group of Kurdish guerrillas in northern Iraq on Tuesday as they tried to enter Turkey, said the General Staff on Wednesday. The General Staff said in a statement the warplanes had “neutralised”, generally meaning killed, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) rebels in the Avasin-Basyan region of northern Iraq. PKK spokesman Ahmet Danees, who is based in northern Iraq, said Turkish forces had bombed for an hour in the Zagros mountains, but that there were no casualties among the PKK. It was not possible to independently verify the reports. Ankara says thousands of separatist PKK rebels use a remote, mountainous part of northern Iraq as a base from which to stage attacks on targets inside Turkey. Turkey staged an eight-day ground incursion against the PKK in February, sending thousands of troops backed by tanks, attack helicopters and jets into Iraq. The military said 240 rebels were killed in the campaign, along with 27 of its own men. That operation prompted concern in Washington about further regional instability and was watched closely in Turkey’s financial markets. “Our target is terrorism and only terrorism, and the operations were 100 percent successful,” Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan told Al Jazeera television, adding, “The operations have greatly boosted Turkey’s security because the party [PKK] was planning attacks inside Turkey, so we secured the borders.” It was not clear when the interview was recorded and whether he was specifically referring to Tuesday’s attack. Turkish warplanes and artillery have periodically bombed and shelled PKK positions in northern Iraq over several months, helped by intelligence provided by the United States. Turkey blames the PKK for the deaths of nearly 40,000 people, mostly Kurds, since the group began its armed campaign for an ethnic homeland in southeast Turkey in 1984. Turkey, like the European Union and the United States, considers the PKK a terrorist organisation. Turkish authorities usually step up their operations against the PKK in spring to prevent rebels crossing into Turkey when weather conditions improve. The General Staff said operations were also continuing in southeast Turkey, with two separate clashes on April 15. It said one rebel had been killed. The statement said numerous weapons and equipment used in making explosives had also been seized during those clashes. Erdogan pledged last month that his government would invest up to $12 billion in southeast Turkey over a five-year period in an effort to drain support for the PKK. The government has pledged to allow a state television channel to broadcast in the Kurdish language. The EU, which Turkey hopes to join, has long urged Ankara to remove restrictions on the Kurdish language and culture.

Link

Warning: Undefined property: stdClass::$T in /data/rantburg.com/www/pgrecentorg.php on line 132
-12 More