The Turkish Armed Forces (TSK) have “neutralized” 14 members of the PKK/YPG terrorist group in northern Syria, the National Defense Ministry announced early Monday.
The Turkish military retaliated against the terrorists who killed Turkish soldiers in kind with fire support in the region where Operation Euphrates Shield was conducted, the ministry said in a statement.
Turkish authorities use the term "neutralize" to imply that the terrorists in question surrendered or were killed or captured.
Türkiye has ramped up airstrikes and counterterrorism operations in the north of Syria, as well as in Iraq where the PKK/YPG terrorists have been particularly aggressive in recent months.
The PKK – listed as a terrorist organization by Türkiye, the United States, Britain and the European Union – is responsible for over 40,000 civilian and security personnel deaths in Türkiye during an almost four-decadelong campaign of terror.
Since Turkish operations have driven its domestic presence to near extinction, the PKK has moved a large chunk of its operations to northern Iraq.
Ankara maintains dozens of military bases there, and it regularly launches operations against the PKK, which operates a stronghold in the Qandil Mountains, located roughly 40 kilometers (25 miles) southeast of the Turkish border in Irbil province, although the area is under de jure control of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).
Both the TSK and the National Intelligence Organization (MIT) regularly conduct cross-border operations in these regions, particularly in northern Iraq, where the PKK terrorists have hideouts and bases from which they carry out attacks against Türkiye.
Türkiye battles the PKK's Syrian offshoot, the YPG, in northern Syria where the group has occupied several resource-rich provinces since 2015 after taking advantage of a power vacuum created by the civil war. The terrorists control areas near the Syrian-Iraqi border and unconfirmed reports say they travel between the two countries secretly.
The YPG has grown stronger in the region, particularly in Deir el-Zour province, home to Syria’s largest oil wells, thanks to material support from the United States. This issue strains Turkish-U.S. ties as Ankara warns its NATO ally against aiding terror elements that threaten its national security, something Washington continues to do despite promising to remove the group from the Turkish border area.
Since Jan. 1, 2023, the terrorist group has carried out 560 attacks falling under Türkiye's counterterrorism operations in Syria and 1,605 terrorists have been neutralized, the Defense Ministry said last week.
A crackdown on PKK/YPG targets intensified in response to the terrorists increasing their deadly attacks in the north of Syria and Iraq, killing a total of 21 Turkish soldiers in less than a month in northern Iraq where Ankara is conducting Operation Claw-Lock, which was launched in April 2022.
