Turkey Killing ISIS Killers

Most of the day yesterday I spent conversing with my Kurdish friends on FB about Erdogan’s attack on the PKK that I have been very supportive of.

Jon

A Kurdish official on Monday accused Turkey of shelling Kurdish-held villages in northern Syria in overnight airstrikes. Ankara denied the allegation, but said it would investigate.

The claim complicates the already difficult situation in the region, as Turkey presses forward with its first direct fight against Islamic State in Syria and a crackdown on Kurdish militants in the wake of deadly attacks last week.

Kurdish fighters in northern Syria have emerged as a key partner to the U.S. in fighting Islamic State, but Turkey fears the rise of a Kurdish minority at home emboldened by the success of militants across the border. A Turkish official in Ankara said Monday that Turkey is not targeting Syrian Kurdish groups in its current military operations.

Turkish artillery shelled two villages in cross-border strikes overnight, according to Idres Nassan Hassan, a Kurdish official in Syria.

“Instead of targeting Islamic State terrorists’ occupied positions, Turkish forces attack our defenders’ positions,” the People’s Defense Units, or YPG, said in a statement. “We are telling the Turkish army to stop shooting at our fighters and their positions.”

The military is strictly targeting Islamic State in Syria and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, which fights for autonomy in Turkey but has for decades been based just across the border in northern Iraq, the official in Ankara said.

“We are investigating claims that the Turkish military engaged positions held by forces other than ISIS,” the official said, referring to Islamic State by a commonly used acronym.

On Friday, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Turkey was launching a campaign against all terrorist organizations, not just Islamic State. Over the weekend, Turkish forces launched airstrikes on Kurdish militants in northern Iraq, destroying warehouses, barracks and logistically important positions of the PKK.

Turkey has also agreed to open up air bases to U.S.-led coalition forces to strike Islamist militants, and detained nearly 1,000 suspects in a nationwide crackdown targeting outlawed organizations, including alleged jihadist and Kurdish militants.