Turkiye to hand over Bashiqa-Zilkan base to Iraq
Shafaq News- Ankara
Turkiye will withdraw from the Bashiqa-Zilkan military base in northern Iraq, which its forces have used since 2015, and hand it over to Iraqi authorities in stages, the Turkish Defense Ministry said on Thursday.
The ministry linked the decision to the progress in security measures taken by the Iraqi government in Sinjar, and welcomed Baghdad's recent steps to impose state authority in the district.
Millî Savunma Bakanlığı Haftalık Basın Bilgilendirme Toplantısı, 1926 yılında Türkiye’nin ilk uçak fabrikası olarak kurulan ve yaklaşık bir asırlık köklü geçmişiyle Türk havacılık sanayisinin gelişiminde önemli bir yere sahip olan Kayseri’deki 2’nci Hava Bakım Fabrika… pic.twitter.com/trFT2F0lvf
— T.C. Millî Savunma Bakanlığı (@tcsavunma) October 1, 2026
The Bashiqa-Zilkan complex lies northeast of Mosul in Nineveh province. According to the ministry, Turkish forces have used the base at the request of Iraqi authorities as part of the fight against ISIS.
Turkiye will continue supporting Iraq militarily after the handover under bilateral agreements covering “building military capacity, sharing counterterrorism expertise, military training and defense industry cooperation,” the ministry added.
The handover will not take place all at once but will proceed under a mechanism and timetable agreed with the Iraqi government, the ministry said without giving a date for completion.
Read more: Baghdad, Ankara agree on Bashiqa–Zilkan Camp transfer
