Ministry of National Defense announced on Friday five PKK terrorists were eliminated in Iraq and another five in Syria.
The ministry said in a statement that the army eliminated five in the Operation Euphrates Shield zone in Syria and Operation Claw-Lock zone in Iraq. It refers to the area of operations of Turkish security forces in the northern parts of two neighbors.
"No place for terrorism and terrorists anywhere!" the ministry said in a statement posted on X.
Türkiye launched Operation Claw-Lock in April 2022 to target the PKK terror organization's hideouts in Iraq's northern Metina, Zap and Avasin-Basyan regions near the Turkish border.
It also has launched a trio of successful counterterrorism operations since 2016 across its border in northern Syria to prevent the formation of a PKK/YPG terror corridor and enable the peaceful settlement of residents: Euphrates Shield (2016), Olive Branch (2018) and Peace Spring (2019).
In its nearly 40-year terror campaign against Türkiye, the PKK-listed as a terrorist organization by Türkiye, the U.S., and the EU-has been responsible for the deaths of more than 40,000 people, including women, children and infants. The YPG is the PKK's Syrian offshoot.
Turkish officials raised the possibility of a large-scale military offensive in Iraq this summer to entirely eliminate the threat of PKK. Defense Minister Yaşar Güler recently described the terrorist group’s presence in neighboring Iraq as the last security loophole in the region. Turkish officials, including President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, made several visits to Baghdad and a semi-autonomous area in the country’s north controlled by the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in recent months to discuss further cooperation against terrorism. Following the visits, the Iraqi army started deploying troops near Turkish military outposts, in the first sign of a new mode of cooperation against PKK.
"We will resolve the problems on our border with Iraq by the summer," President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said in March, adding that the country has effective plans to wipe out PKK terrorists permanently. The president has pledged the establishment of a "30-to 40-kilometer security corridor across the country's border with Iraq and Syria."
