BAGHDAD: Turkish air strikes on northern Iraq targeting a group affiliated with Turkiye’s outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) killed five people on Friday, local sources said.
The strikes came after a Syria war monitor said Turkish drone strikes had killed 27 civilians in Syria in a 24-hour military escalation, after an attack on Wednesday at state-run Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) near Ankara, which Turkiye said killed five people.
After the Ankara attack, Turkiye’s defense ministry had announced strikes against sites linked to the PKK in Iraq and Syria.
“A series of Turkish air strikes targeted the Sinjar Resistance Units,” a security official told AFP, reporting a total of five people killed, as the PKK claimed Wednesday’s attack.
The official spoke from Nineveh province, where Sinjar is located, under cover of anonymity because he was not authorized to brief the media.
Speaking under similar ground rules, a second official in Sinjar gave the same toll for the “Turkish aerial bombardments targeting positions of the Sinjar Resistance Units.”
In a statement, the anti-terrorist service of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region, adjacent to Nineveh, gave a lower toll of “three fighters killed” in Sinjar.
It said the strikes by Turkish drones and warplanes targeted PKK positions.
Turkiye frequently carries out ground and air offensives on positions of the PKK — which has waged a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state — in northern Iraq, the autonomous Kurdistan region and the mountains of Sinjar.
Turkiye has also over the past 25 years operated several dozen military bases in northern Iraq in its war against the PKK.
Five killed in Turkish strikes on PKK allies: Iraqi local sources
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Five killed in Turkish strikes on PKK allies: Iraqi local sources
- Turkish drone strikes had killed 27 civilians in Syria in a 24-hour military escalation, after an attack on Wednesday at state-run Turkish Aerospace Industries (TAI) near Ankara
- “A series of Turkish air strikes targeted the Sinjar Resistance Units,” a security official told AFP
Supplies running out at Syria’s Al-Hol camp as clashes block aid deliveries
DAMASCUS: An international humanitarian organization has warned that supplies are running out at a camp in northeast Syria housing thousands of people linked to the Daesh group, as the country’s government fights to establish control over an area formerly controlled by Kurdish fighters.
The late Friday statement by Save the Children came a week after government forces captured Al-Hol camp, which is home to more than 24,000 people, mostly children and women, including many wives or widows of Daesh members.
The capture of the camp came after intense fighting earlier this month between government forces and members of the Kurdish-led and US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces during which forces loyal to interim President Ahmad Al-Sharaa captured wide areas in eastern and northeastern Syria.
The SDF signed a deal to end the fighting after suffering major defeats, but sporadic clashes between it and the government have continued.
Save the Children said that “critical supplies in Al-Hol camp are running dangerously low” as clashes are blocking the safe delivery of humanitarian aid.
It added that last week’s clashes around the camp forced aid agencies to temporarily suspend regular operations at Al-Hol. It added that the main road leading to the camp remains unsafe, which is preventing humanitarian workers from delivering food and water or running basic services for children and families.
“The situation in Al-Hol camp is rapidly deteriorating as food, water and medicines run dangerously low,” said Rasha Muhrez, Save the Children Syria country director. “If humanitarian organizations are unable to resume work, children will face still more risks in the camp, which was already extremely dangerous for them before this latest escalation.”
Muhrez added that all parties to the conflict must ensure a safe humanitarian corridor to Al-Hol so basic services can resume and children can be protected. “Lives depend on it,” she said.
The SDF announced a new agreement with the central government on Friday, aiming to stabilize a ceasefire that ended weeks of fighting and lay out steps toward integrating the US-backed force into the army and police forces.
