Iraq’s Prime Minister Haider Al Abadi addresses the 70th Session of the United Nations General A …
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Iraq’s foreign ministry has summoned the Turkish ambassador to Baghdad to protest at the deployment of Turkish forces near the northern Iraqi city of Mosul and demand their immediate withdrawal.
Turkey will stop sending troops to northern Iraq after Baghdad gave it a 48 hour ultimatum to withdraw on Saturday.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has issued an order for his country’s air force to be on alert as a deadline to Turkey to pull out its troops from the Arab country approaches. Following which, Turkey assured Iraq it would not take any steps to violate Baghdad’s sovereignty or territorial harmony.
Prime Minister Abadi, meanwhile, has threatened to turn to the UN Security Council, saying “Iraq has the right to use all available options” if the troops are not withdrawn within 48 hours.
Reports said a Turkish training battalion equipped with armoured vehicles was deployed near the city of Mosul to provide training to Iraqi paramilitary groups against IS militants.
“We call on the Turkish authorities to withdraw its military force from Iraqi territories and not repeating such an incident that hurt the relations between the two neighboring countries”, Masum said.
As said by the source, “Turkish soldiers have reached the Mosul Bashiqa region, they are there as part of routine training exercises”.
A much-anticipated counter-offensive by Iraqi forces to retake Mosul from ISIL has been repeatedly postponed because they are tied down in fighting elsewhere.
In a statement, Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) spokesperson Sefin Dizayi confirmed that Turkish troop reinforcements had arrived in Mosul. “This is a part of that training”, one senior Turkish official said.
Davutoglu alleged the camp, located some 30 km (19 miles) northeast of Mosul, was set up at the Mosul governor’s request and in coordination with the Iraqi Defense Ministry.
The Iraqi foreign ministry in a statement on state television described the Turkish deployment as “an incursion” and rejected any military operation that was not co-ordinated with the federal government in Baghdad. The U.S.-led coalition has been staging airstrikes against Daesh targets in Iraq and Syria since mid-September 2014. “This includes deployment of USA military personnel, as well as military personnel from any other country”.
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Apparently so, according to the Turkish government, which says over 2,500 Kurdish Peshmerga soldiers and officers have attended weapons and artillery training provided at the camp.
