Three killed in fresh gunfight in south Turkey
At least three people have reportedly been killed in a fresh gunfight in southern Turkey, as violence escalates between Ankara and supporters of the autonomy-seeking Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
The official Anadolu news agency said Friday that supporters of the PKK fired shots at police officers and workers in the vicinity of the town of Silopi, located near Turkey’s border with Iraq.
The security forces were supervising the workers who were called to fill the ditches near the town that prevented police from entering the neighborhood. Police said people from inside the town started the gunfight, which lasted four hours and critically injured a police officer. An armored vehicle was hit by a rocket, police said.
The deadly fight came nearly two weeks after Ankara began airstrikes on positions of the PKK in northern Iraq, prompting the Kurdish group to declare its peace negotiations with the government as “dead and meaningless.”
The airstrikes, which were initiated simultaneous with attacks on positions purportedly held by the Takfiri ISIL militants in northern Syria, have seriously infuriated supporters of the PKK who mostly live along Turkey’s southern borders with Iraq and Syria. More than 35 people have reportedly been killed in the renewed violence between the Kurds and the Turkish government.
Also on Friday, pro-Kurdish lawmakers in the parliament again expressed doubt about the authenticity of the government’s claims in fighting the Kurdish militants in northern Iraq, saying civilians were killed in a recent attack claimed to be targeting a camp of Kurdish rebels.
The lawmakers, who were in northern Iraq as part of a three-day fact-finding mission, said Turkish jets killed eight Iraqi civilians and injured over two dozen others in their attack on the town of Zargel last week. They said six residential buildings were completely destroyed and other buildings, including a mosque, were damaged during the strike.
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