Turkiye "neutralizes" two PKK members in Iraqi Kurdistan
Shafaq News/ On Thursday, two PKK members were neutralized in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq.
The term "neutralize" is commonly used by Turkish authorities to indicate that the terrorists either surrendered, killed, or captured during the military operations.
The Turkish Anadolu News Agency quoted security sources as saying that Turkiye's National Intelligence Organization (MIT) "successfully targeted two PKK/KCK terrorists who plan to infiltrate Turkish military bases in northern Iraq."
The PKK members, identified as Ahmet Bayar (codenamed Tufan Kocer) and Ahmed Ibrahim El Ahmed (codenamed Mervan Zerevan), were targeted in the Hakurk region.
Anadolu reported that Bayar, who joined the Kurdistan Workers' Party in 2012 and previously operated in Syria, served as a bodyguard for senior PKK members, while El Ahmed received assassination training in Iraq's Qandil region in 2014.
Since the beginning of May, the Turkish forces have neutralized about 38 PKK members.
Last April, 91 PKK members were neutralized in the Matina and Hakurk regions in northern Iraq in three separate operations.
Notably, Turkiye conducts frequent operations against the PKK in northern Iraq, mainly in the Kurdistan Region, in an attempt to "eradicate" them from the borders.
Turkiye's operations have included a range of cross-border aerial and ground operations called Pençe (Operation Claw.)
Since 2019, Ankara has established several bases in the Duhok Governorate in northern Iraq through informal agreements between Turkiye and the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG).
Informal figures suggest that Turkiye has a permanent deployment of 5,000 to 10,000 soldiers in Iraqi territory, where it has created a de facto secure zone and moved the armed struggle onto Iraqi soil. It has also built roads in Iraq to connect its military bases and achieve more effective area control. The last one was in February 2024, when Ankara said the road is to "streamline the movement of military and logistical supplies to its bases in the Kurdistan Region of Iraq."
