ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Iraq's Foreign Minister Fuad Hussein said on Tuesday that he will call on the United Nations Security Council members in the coming hours to help Baghdad expel Turkish and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) forces from Iraq.
The UN Security Council is expected to discuss Iraq’s situation later tonight, especially the artillery strike, blamed on Turkey, which killed nine Iraqi vacationers and injured 31 others in Duhok province's Parakh village on Wednesday. Hussein has arrived in New York to attend the meeting and provide a detailed report on the deadly shelling.
“We are trying to persuade the members of the Security Council to expel Turkish forces from Iraqi territory,” Hussein was quoted by Iraqi state media as saying. The minister added that he will also request from the Council to “pass a resolution to help Iraq expel the PKK.”
“It is our duty to work with the concerned countries to expel the PKK from Iraq.”
Turkey has denied killing the nine civilians, with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan claiming on Monday that the attack was carried out by the PKK to harm Ankara-Baghdad relations. The Kurdish rebels have denied any involvement in the attack, claiming that its forces were not even present in the area when the incident took place. Hussein confirmed to Rudaw on Saturday that the PKK fighters were not present during the shelling.
Hussein also told the Iraqi state media that Turkey’s insistence that it did not kill the Iraqi holidaymakers “does not help as we have information confirming that it carried out the attack.”
Turkey has over 4,000 soldiers as well as 100 military bases in Iraq, according to the Iraqi minister.
Turkey often targets the PKK at home and inside the Kurdistan Region, considering it a “terrorist’ organziation. The group’s stated goal is to struggle for the increased rights of Kurds in Turkey.
The PKK entered the rugged areas of what is now the Kurdistan Region in the eighties following a deal with Peshmerga forces who were revolting against Iraqi former regimes. The Region's authorities have in recent years called on the group to withdraw forces but the rebels have repeatedly refused to leave, claiming that they own the Region as well.
