Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan says that Turkish troops had been stationed at a military base in northern Iraq at the request of Iraq’s leader since 2014, al-Jazeera reported on Wednesday.
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“We will discuss all the issues in detail, but more time will be spent on what Ankara’s role in the fight against ISIL will be after North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and other powers have lent support to Turkey”, said Barzani on Tuesday before departing.
The government of Erbil has always been friendly with Ankara, despite the Turkish government’s military and police campaign against Kurds in Turkey and nearby Syria. The Turkish force comprises of 150 soldiers only, and is located in the vicinity of the city of Mosul which ISIS has been occupying for the past year and a half.
Erdogan however announced a trilateral meeting between Turkey, Northern Iraq Kurdish leaders and United States officials scheduled to take place on December 21, according to AP.
A Turkish military presence in northern Iraq is part of “planned training”, Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said on Wednesday.
He insisted the troops consist of a non-combative force.
Turkey denies violating Iraq’s territorial unity and says it sent troops last week to Bashiqa camp, northeast of Mosul, only to expand the training of Iraqi militias fighting Islamic State.
The Foreign Ministry announced that the state of security in Iraq can change rapidly and due to the worsening relations between the Turkish and the Iraqi government, the Ministry fears that Turkish citizens are not safe in Iraq.
“Our understanding of the original Turkish deployment is that it was negotiated with the Iraqi government”.
Selcen, who served in the Turkish embassy in Baghdad from 2003 to 2006, said the environment in certain parts of Iraq is not friendly to Turkey.
Iraqi officials gave Turkey a 48-hour deadline to withdraw additional troops and Turkey declared it had halted the new deployment.
An earlier statement by Iraq’s Council of Ministers, headed by Abadi, said “Iraq’s sovereignty and its geographical borders are a red line particularly since there exists no signed agreement between Iraq nor any accord permitting Turkey to trespass the country’s borders under any pretext”.
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In September, 16 Turkish workers were abducted in Baghdad by an unknown armed group that used a familiar Shiite slogan and threatened to attack Turkish interests in Iraq if its demands were not met. The men were eventually released.
