ANKARA, Turkey (AP) Turkish officials say Kurdish rebels have detonated a vehicle bomb in Turkey’s mainly Kurdish southeast that killed two soldiers and wounded four.
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The attack came after the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) rebel group threatened to no longer observe a truce, following waves of Turkish air strikes on its positions in northern Iraq.
Meanwhile, the attacks on the Kurdish positions effectively marked the end of a two-year ceasefire and a tenuous peace process designed to end the conflict between Turkey and the PKK that has killed more than 40,000.
The new wave of tension is feared to pose a severe blow to what is known in Turkey as the “solution process”, during which the PKK declared a cease-fire in 2013.
The bombing comes a day after Turkey launched airstrikes on PKK positions in northern Iraq as part of a two-pronged “anti-terror” offensive that is also targeting “Islamic State” (“IS”) jihadists in Syria.
The PKK, which Ankara and Washington deem a terrorist group, has also targeted police officers in the southeast and elsewhere, accusing the Islamist-rooted central government of covertly helping Islamic State to the detriment of Syrian Kurds. More recently last month, they ejected the Islamic State group from their stronghold of Tal Abyad along the border with Turkey, robbing the IS of a key avenue for smuggling oil and foreign fighters. “No one should doubt our determination”, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Saturday.
But the strikes could also trigger resentment and violent retaliation from Kurds, leaving Turkey fighting a two-pronged war against ISIS and the PKK. “There is no PKK in Rojava”, he said, using the name applied by Kurds to the territory they claim in Syria and rejecting an allegation often made by Turks and Syrian Arabs that the PKK is deeply engaged in the battles there.
“There is no connection between these air strikes against PKK and recent understandings to intensify US-Turkey cooperation against ISIL”, Brett McGurk, the deputy special presidential envoy for the coalition to counter ISIS, said on Twitter.
A statement from North Atlantic Treaty Organisation Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said: “Turkey requested the meeting in view of the seriousness of the situation after the heinous terrorist attacks in recent days, and also to inform Allies of the measures it is taking”. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said nine Daesh militants were killed in the raids.
“The conclusion of an agreement between Turkey and the U.S.-led anti-ISIS coalition to open Turkish airbases for coalition aircraft conducting sorties against the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS) marks a major shift in Turkish policy which will provide immediate boost to U.S. efforts to degrade and ultimately defeat ISIS”.
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Turkish leaders pledged further action against the Islamic State on Friday after Turkish jets bombed Islamic State targets in Syria for the first time, opening an important new front in the war against the militants. As of Saturday, almost 600 people had been detained.
