Turkey bombs in Iraq and Syria

News

 

Turkey  

 

Turkish attacks against PKK and YPG  

 

TT 

 

Updated 23.15 | Published 21.14  

 

 

 

Fire smoke over Tel Abyad in Syria after Turkish bombings. The picture was taken today, Sunday, from southeast Turkey. Photo: Lefteris Pitarakis / AP  

 

Turkey has carried out airstrikes in northern Iraq and Syria during the night of Saturday.  

 

A total of 54 targets belonging to the PKK and YPG groups were attacked.  

 

Among other things, caves and bunkers were attacked.  

 

The airstrikes come a day after nine Turkish soldiers were killed during a clash with the PKK at a military base in the Iraqi city of Metina. 

 

This is announced by the Ministry of Defense of Turkey. Both the PKK and the YPG are classified as terrorists by Turkey.  

 

Over 100 people have also been arrested in raids across Turkey suspected of links to the PKK. 

 

 

A YPG flag flies on a building, shortly after the start of the Turkish operation inside Syria. Photo: Lefteris Pitarakis / AP  

 

FACTS 

YPG  

The YPG is an armed branch of the Kurdish party PYD (Democratic Union Party), which is the largest political party among Syrian Kurds. The two branches, like many Kurdish organizations, have links to the PKK.  

 

Turkey was very unhappy when the US-led coalition of Western countries backed the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) in the war in Syria, where the designated YPG (People's Defense Units) is by far the largest phalanx. The SDF recaptured, among other things, the IS stronghold of Raqqa. 

 

(TT)  

 

FACTS 

PKK  

The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) was founded in 1978 as a Marxist party. 

 

The movement's goal was a Kurdish state in southeastern Turkey as well as adjacent parts of neighboring countries.  

 

In 1984, the PKK took up arms against the Turkish state in the struggle for independence.  

 

The PKK is labeled a terrorist by Turkey, the EU and the US.  

 

In 2022, according to information from prosecutor Hans Ihrman, the PKK carried out 54 attacks in which 40 people were killed and another 150 were injured. That makes the PKK the eleventh deadliest terrorist organization in the world according to the Institute for economics and peace.  

 

Among other things, Turkey has put forward demands for tougher measures against the PKK in order to approve Sweden's NATO membership. 

 

(TT)  

 

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held an emergency security meeting on Saturday. Archive image. Photo: Denes Erdos/AP/TT

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