Areas including the Mount Cudi region, Gabar Mountain, as well as parts of Cizre, Silopi, and Beytussebap have been declared as “temporary special security zones” in order to “prevent violence and prevent any negative situation that may occur,” the office of Sirnak’s governor said.
“It is forbidden for our citizens to enter the aforementioned areas for the safety of life and property,” it added, with the ban starting on June 30 until July 14.
Sirnak is a small Kurdish-majority province in southeast Turkey, bordering the Kurdistan Region. It has seen frequent clashes between the Turkish military and the PKK - an armed group struggling for the increased rights of Kurds in Turkey and designated a terrorist organization by Ankara.
In mid May, at least three Turkish soldiers and two PKK members were killed during a Turkish military operation in Sirnak. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan at the time said that “we will resolutely continue our fight against the separatist organization PKK and its extensions inside and outside our borders, and we will not stop until the last terrorist is eliminated.”
In November, Turkey launched a domestic operation targeting PKK fighters in Sirnak - an extension of an earlier campaign across several provinces seeking to remove the PKK from the countryside.
