At least two soldiers have been killed and 24 others wounded in a suicide blast allegedly by Kurdish fighters in eastern Turkey, officials say.
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To briefly describe the situation, the Turkish government recently began to attack the Islamic State and now allows the US to use its air bases in “south-eastern Turkey” (northern Kurdistan) to attack ISIS in Syria.
Witnesses said that at least five villagers were killed in Zargali by Turkish jets targeting rebels from the PKK, whose bitter insurgency in Turkey for Kurdish rights has been reignited in recent days after a two-year ceasefire.
A tractor truck reportedly filled with two tons of explosives was apparently detonated by a Kurdish PKK suicide bomber.
Turkey’s army said in a statement that “long-range guns” were also found. Four of the injured were in a serious condition. The members of these networks represent a key threat to Turkey’s internal security.
The Dogan news agency added that militants also set up ambushes on roads to prevent medical teams getting to the scene.
But counterattacks by the PKK have escalated violence between Turkish government forces and Kurdish insurgents.
Decades of fighting between Turkey and the PKK, which initially sought an independent state for the Kurds before calling instead for greater autonomy for the ethnic minority, ended with a historic but fragile ceasefire in March 2013.
The Turkish authorities have claimed that the militants of Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) is said to be behind this enormous explosion that badly damaged the building turning it to rubble.
The Turkish foreign ministry has already vowed a full investigation into the claims and said a joint study would be conducted with the regional authorities in Iraqi Kurdistan.
The airstrike has become the most controversial single action yet in Turkey’s campaign against the Kurdish militants’ bases in northern Iraq that began more than a week ago.
The PKK has been blamed for a series of attacks, leading Turkey to attack its positions.
The impact of the bombing campaign – which has seen daily raids by dozens of Turkish F-16s on PKK holdouts in remote mountain territory in northern Iraq – remains unclear.
The U.S. has gained access to Turkey’s Incerlik air base near Syria’s northern border, as well as Turkey’s participation in attacks on Islamic state fighters from the air.
The president of Iraq’s Kurdistan region on Saturday condemned Turkey’s bombardment of Zargala, a village there which he said had killed civilians, and called for a return to the peace process between Ankara and the PKK.
“[The] PKK should withdraw from the region so that civilians in the Kurdish region will not be the victims of the clashes”, the statement said.
Anatolia said that among those wounded in the northern Iraq strikes was Nurettin Demirtas, the brother of the leader of the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), Selahattin Demirtas.
Turkey’s allies have urged it to resume a Kurdish peace process. They were eventually ousted by Kurdish Peshmerga and PKK fighters, supported by US-led coalition air strikes.
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Al Jazeera’s Zeina Khodr, reporting from southeastern Turkish city of Gaziantep, said it is highly unlikely that the PKK is going to heed the call from the KRG.
