Turkey FM calls for regional cooperation to fight PKK
by AFP Staff Writers
Baghdad (AFP) Jan 26, 2025

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan called for combined regional efforts to combat outlawed Kurdish fighters in Iraq and neighbouring Syria during a visit to Baghdad on Sunday.

The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has fought a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state, holds positions in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region, which also hosts Turkish military bases.

The PKK is listed as a terrorist organisation by Turkey and its Western allies, and Ankara accuses Kurdish forces in Syria of links to the outlawed group.

"I want to emphasise this fact in the strongest way: the PKK is targeting Turkey, Iraq and Syria," Fidan said in a press conference with his Iraqi counterpart Fuad Hussein.

"We must combine all our resources and destroy both Daesh and the PKK," he added, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State group (IS).

Fidan's visit comes after two Iraqi border guards were killed Friday near the Turkish border in a shooting that Baghdad blamed on the PKK. After the attack, Ankara vowed to work with Iraq to secure their common frontier.

Turkey regularly launches strikes against the PKK in Iraq and Kurdish fighters in Syria.

Baghdad has recently sharpened its tone against the PKK, and last year it quietly listed the group as a "banned organisation" -- though Ankara demands the Iraqi government do more in the fight against the militant group.

"Our ultimate expectation from Iraq is that it recognises the PKK, which it has declared a banned organisation, as a terrorist organisation as well," Fidan said.

In August, Baghdad and Ankara signed a military cooperation deal to establish joint command and training centres with the aim of fighting the PKK.

The foreign ministers also discussed the fight against IS on the Iraqi-Syrian border, Hussein said during the press conference, as well as the situation in Syria, where longtime leader Bashar al-Assad was toppled in December.

"There are clear understandings between... Turkey and Iraq on how to address" the situation there, he said, adding that Baghdad was in contact with the new Syrian authorities and was "trying to coordinate on many issues".

Earlier this month, Fidan threatened to launch a military operation against Kurdish forces in Syria, where Turkey has carried out successive ground operations to push the fighters away from its border.

The Kurdish forces there are seen by the West as essential in the fight against IS.

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