Turkish warplanes targeting Kurdish rebels bombed villages deep in northern Iraq yesterday, killing one woman and forcing hundreds of people to flee their homes, local officials said.
In Ankara, the Turkish military's General Staff said in a statement its warplanes had attacked targets of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which uses northern Iraq as a base from which to attack security forces inside Turkey.
Private broadcaster CNN Turk quoted unnamed Turkish military sources denying that Iraqi villages had been targeted.
If the death of the woman is confirmed it would be the first since Turkey stepped up artillery bombardments and airstrikes on suspected PKK bases in the Qandil mountains in October.
The mayor of Sankasar town, north of the Iraqi Kurdish city of Sulaimaniya, Abdullah Ibrahim, said 200 families had fled their homes in villages in the Sankasar and Jarawa administrative areas and at least 10 houses had been destroyed.
Commenting on the airstrikes, Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said his government was determined to use every kind of instrument in the fight against terrorism - diplomatic, political and military.
"We will continue to wage this battle for our nation's unity and peace, both inside and outside Turkey," he said in televized comments made during a visit to the Aegean port of Izmir.
The mayors of Jarawa and Sankasar said the airstrikes were launched at 2 am (7 am Beijing time) and continued for several hours. The villages targeted are about 100 km south of the Turkish border.
The mayors said one woman was killed and at least two people wounded. A senior officer in Iraq's border guards confirmed the airstrike but said he had no details on casualties.
Turkish ground forces have also been shelling the area where the guerrillas are believed to be operating, the statement said.
PKK official Ferman Garzan, speaking on the pro-separatist Roj TV which broadcasts from Europe, said the Turkish aerial bombardment had not killed or wounded any guerrillas but had claimed the lives of two villagers.
Ankara has massed up to 100,000 troops near the mountainous border with northern Iraq, along with tanks and artillery.
Turkey says it has the right to defend itself under international law and stage cross-border attacks into northern Iraq against an estimated 3,000 PKK rebels hiding there.
The Turkish Cabinet authorized the armed forces to conduct a cross-border operation in late November.
Analysts say a major Turkish incursion does not appear imminent, arguing that many Kurdish rebels have moved into neighboring Iran and that weather conditions in northern Iraq are worsening, making a large-scale military strike difficult.
Source:China Daily/Agencies
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