Turkey to establish new military base in the Kurdistan Region

Kurdistan 12:38 PM - 2021-05-01

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Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu announced on Friday that Turkey will establish a military base in Metina, a mountainous area close to the Turkish border in Kurdistan's Region's Duhok, to surveil the broader region. 

 

Speaking to members of the ruling Justice and Development Party's executive board, Soylu said, “Metina is an important region. Just as we did in Syria, we will build a base here and monitor the region. This area is a route to Qandil; we will control this route.” He was referring to PKK headquarters in the Kurdistan Region’s mountains.

 

Soylu did not clarify his comparison with Syria, where Turkish troops occupy over 8,000 square miles in the north of the country, including Kurdish-majority Afrin, where the terrain is mostly flat. 

 

Soylu’s statement came as Turkish special forces backed by F-16 fighter jets, helicopter gunships, and drones kept up an offensive against PKK targets launched on April 23 in Metina and the neighboring Avashin and Basyan regions in Duhok. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the offensive, dubbed “Operation Claw Lightning,” was designed to “completely end the presence of the terror threat … along our southern border.”

 

Turkey has carried out cross-border offensives of varying magnitude against the PKK for decades. However, in recent years, it's begun to establish more of a sustained presence in a growing number of bases and checkpoints dotting the mountains of the Kurdistan Region. 

 

Turkey has repeatedly bombarded areas within the Kurdistan Region claiming that it is targeting PKK in the area. It has launched air and ground military operation in the Kurdistan Region in mid-June last year, on the grounds of targeting alleged PKK positions. 

 

Thousands of acres of land have been burnt and many villages have been evacuated due to Turkish bombings, and even civilian casualties have fallen due to the continuous Turkish operations in the Kurdistan Region.

 

According to Al-Monitor, Arzu Yilmaz, a Middle East scholar and visiting fellow at Hamburg University reckons that there are more than 5,000 Turkish forces currently deployed in Iraqi Kurdistan and in Bashiqa, an area under Iraqi central government control lying east of Mosul.

 

KRG leaders have warned that the wave of Turkish incursions, which have caused dozens of civilian deaths has made advances, deploying troops to within three kilometers of Duhok's Kesta village. Heavy clashes have terrified villagers and forced families to flee their homes. The Iraqi government frequently condemns Turkey’s operations but appears powerless to stop them.

 

It is noteworthy that the PKK is an armed Kurdish group that has fought the Turkish government for decades, seeking increased rights of Kurds. Turkey considers the PKK a terrorist organization and a threat to its national security and it frequently sends fighter jets, attack helicopters, drones, and ground troops across the border to fight the group.

 

 

 

PUKmedia