Turkish army build-up fuels anxiety

Press TV
Wednesday May 30, 2007

Turkey has deployed a group of tanks in its border with Iraq, raising speculation of a possible attack into northern Iraq against Kurdish rebels.

A group of 20 tanks loaded on trucks on Wednesday emerged from army barracks in Mardin near Syria and headed towards the Iraqi border in southeast Turkey, already the scene of a major army offensive against rebels of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).

Speculation about an imminent incursion into Iraq has grown since Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said last week he saw eye to eye with the army over possible military action, despite unease in the United States, Turkey's NATO ally, about such a move, Reuters reported.

Along the border in southeast Turkey, many Kurdish villagers have formed part of a state-backed militia which fights alongside the army against the PKK rebels.

"We support the operations in the mountains here because the PKK made us suffer a lot. I lost 10 people from my family," said Nadir Karadeniz, an official in the village of Gorumlu, located near a military base just a few kilometers from the border.

Military operations are currently focused on the rebels already inside Turkish territory. Security forces killed 10 PKK fighters in clashes across the southeast on Tuesday.

The United States has repeatedly urged Turkey not to send troops into Iraq because it says it will only complicate the situation. The two countries have agreed over various measures, including financial ones, to try to curb the PKK.

On Tuesday, Turkey formally asked Washington to avoid any further violation of its airspace after two US F-16 warplanes flew into Turkish airspace near the Iraqi border.

US diplomats claim the incident was an "accident" but Turkish media affirm it was intended to send a message to Ankara not to send its troops into Iraq.

But pressure within Turkey for an incursion is growing after a suicide bombing in the capital Ankara last week killed six people and injured scores more. Authorities blamed the attack on the PKK, which denied any involvement.

More than 37,000 people have been killed since the PKK, blacklisted as a terrorist group by Turkey, took up arms in 1984 for self-rule in mainly Kurdish east and southeast of the country.