Military: Turkish troops cross into northern Iraq in pursuit of Kurdish rebels

Military: Turkish troops cross into northern Iraq

ANKARA, Turkey — Turkey sent hundreds of elite troops into northern Iraq on Wednesday to chase Kurdish guerrillas in an operation that could increase tensions within the region.

The soldiers killed four rebels escaping after a failed attack on a Turkish unit near the border, the Turkish military said. It did not say when the troops, who were supported by Turkish warplanes, would withdraw. But private NTV television, without citing any sources, said the soldiers were on their way back to Turkey.

The military has repeatedly staged air and ground assaults against Kurdish rebel bases in northern Iraq. The last major incursion was in February 2008, when thousands of ground forces staged a weeklong offensive into Iraq that worried Iraqi Kurds.

Iraqi Kurds have been cooperating with Turkey in its fight against the rebels of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, sharing intelligence on the guerrillas’ movements and positions. However, the latest incursion could trigger protests from Baghdad and the semiautonomous Iraqi Kurdish region.

The incursion comes as the rebels have stepped up attacks in Turkey, killing more than 30 soldiers in recent months and causing public outrage.

The conflict has killed some 40,000 people since it began in 1984. Many PKK guerrillas shelter in the mountains of neighboring Iraq, crossing the border for hit-and-run assaults. The group is considered a terrorist organization by both the European Union and United States.

The public fury and escalating military response threaten to derail an already faltering government effort to defuse the insurgency by granting unprecedented cultural and political freedoms to Turkey’s Kurds, the country’s largest minority group.

The military said on its website that three commando companies and one special forces battalion penetrated 2 miles (3 kilometers) into Iraq in the Wednesday incursion.

Turkish warplanes also pounded Kurdish rebel positions and mortar and anti-aircraft units deeper inside Iraqi territory on Wednesday, the military said.

The offensive was ordered after the rebels attempted an unsuccessful attack on troops near the Turkish border town of Uludere late Tuesday, the military said.

“The air operation was monitored from the command headquarters and it was noted that the targets were successfully hit,” the military said.

The Turkish military estimates around 4,000 rebels are based just across the border in Iraq and that about 2,500 operate inside Turkey. Last month, Turkey killed at least 19 Kurdish rebels in an airstrike on rebel hideouts in northern Iraq.

The PKK has freely operated in northern Iraq, a semiautonomous Iraqi Kurdish entity since the Gulf War, benefiting from a power vacuum for decades.

The last ground offensive in 2008 yielded mixed results, with many guerrillas making a comeback to bases along the border after the Turkish units withdrew. The incursion also worried the region’s Iraqi Kurds who feared that a prolonged Turkish military presence could destabilize the relatively safer Iraqi territory.

Turkey occasionally coordinates attacks with Iran on Kurdish rebel bases on Mount Qandil, which sits on the Iranian-Iraqi border and from where a sub-rebel group stages hit-and-run attacks on Iranian targets in a similar war for Kurdish rights in Iran.

Syria long harbored the rebels but forced guerrilla leader Abdullah Ocalan to leave the country after Turkey threatened war in late 1998, eventually leading to the capture of the rebel chief on Feb. 15. 1999.

Earlier this month, Turkey offered greater economic cooperation with Iraqi Kurds, pressuring the region’s president, Massoud Barzani, to jointly combat Turkish Kurdish rebel hideouts in northern Iraq that the rebels have used as a springboard for attacks.

Turkey also wants Iraqi Kurds to shut down the Makhmur refugee camp, which houses an estimated 10,000-11,000 Turkish Kurds who fled to Iraq in the early 1990s during fighting between Turkish troops and Kurdish rebels. Turkish authorities accuse Kurdish guerrillas of indoctrinating children in the camp to become rebels.

A Kurdish interior ministry official, however, said there were no plans to close the Makhmur camp. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he wasn’t authorized to speak to media.

U.S. State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley told reporters Wednesday that the United States and Turkey share information and cooperate regularly, but he couldn’t say whether the United States was involved in Turkey’s latest pursuit of Kurdish guerrillas.

“These are security matters that directly effect the Turkish government and the Turkish people,” Crowley said. “Turkey, like any country, has the right to defend itself against terrorist organizations. We will continue to work with Turkey depending on how this goes. We certainly understand the reasons behind the action.”

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Associated Press writers Selcan Hacaoglu in Ankara and Yahya Brazing in Sulaimaniyah, Iraq, contributed to this report.