Iraq
Turkish helicopters fly during an attack on a PKK camp on Oct 30, 2007 in the Cudi mountains, Sirnak province, near the Turkish-Iraqi border in southeastern Turkey. File photo: Mustafa Ozer/AFP
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — Turkey launched renewed airstrikes on a Zakho village on Monday, increasing fear among villagers.
The windows of homes in the Zakho village of Banka Bn were shattered by Turkish airstrikes on Monday night, with no casualties reported, locals told Rudaw’s Yousef Mousa on Tuesday.
“The adults are not scared now, but what about the children?” one resident of the village told Mousa on Tuesday, adding that Turkey bombs the area “every three to four days.”
Another resident pointed to the mosque and said, “These windows are all broken, windows of some of the houses are broken.”
“We hope the Regional Government finds a solution for this,” he said.
“There are a number of houses left in this village, we have no other choice - that’s why we have stayed in this village,” he added.
Turkish planes also bombed the Mergasor district in Erbil province on Tuesday morning.
Mergasor mayor Ghafour Ahmed told Rudaw’s Bakhtyar Qadir that Turkish planes bombed Mount Shirin’s Gali Mala on Tuesday.
The mayor of Mergasor said this is the first time that the area has been bombed and no damage has been caused by the bombing, but locals are scared.
Turkey launched renewed airstrikes in the Kurdistan Region and disputed territories in mid-June, dubbed Operation Claw-Eagle. Said to target Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK) positions in the Kurdistan Region, eight civilians have been killed in the strikes. The ground operation, Claw-Tiger, concluded in September.
The PKK is a Kurdish armed group that has fought the Turkish state for decades for increased rights for the country’s Kurdish minority. It's headquarters are in the Kurdistan Region's Qandil mountains.
A staggering 504 villages have been emptied by Turkish and Iranian incursions into the Kurdistan Region since 1992, according to a report by the Kurdistan Parliament.
Both Erbil and Baghdad have repeatedly called on Ankara to halt its attacks and have demanded the PKK cease using Kurdistan Region and Iraqi territory to launch attacks on Turkey.
A Turkish airstrike targeting an alleged PKK vehicle cut off the electricity supply to two villages in Duhok’s Zakho district on December 6.
“This is the second time in two weeks the Turkish military has bombed this area, they also attacked last week and cut off the electricity,” Dlsher Abdulstar, mayor of Batifa subdistrict told Rudaw’s Nasir Ali.
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