Turkey’s Air Force has struck Kurdish targets in Iraq and Syria in apparent retaliation for an attack on a key state-run defence company that killed five people and wounded more than 20.
On Thursday, the Ministry of National Defence said 47 targets were “destroyed” in the aerial offensive on Wednesday, without providing details on the locations that were hit. It said “all kinds of precautions” were taken to prevent civilian harm.
Defence Minister Yasar Guler said Turkish forces struck 29 targets in northern Iraq and 18 in northern Syria.
The United States-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said on Thursday that Turkish air attacks in northern and eastern Syria killed 12 civilians, including two children, and wounded 25 people.
Spearheaded by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and including Arab fighters, the SDF has been a major partner for the US-led coalition against ISIL (ISIS). It controls a quarter of Syria, including oil fields and areas where some 900 US soldiers are deployed.
Turkey says the YPG is a terrorist organisation that is closely tied to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which it blames for an attack on Wednesday in which fighters set off explosives and opened fire at the aerospace and defence company TUSAS, near the capital Ankara, that designs and manufactures civilian and military aircraft, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) and other defence industry and space systems.
The Turkish Defence Ministry said “59 militants … were neutralised, a term usually used to mean killed, in the strikes.
Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya wrote on X that Turkish investigators had identified one of the attackers as a “PKK terrorist” codenamed “Rojger” and a woman called Mine Sevjin Alcicek.
Guler also pointed a finger at the PKK. “We will pursue them until the last terrorist is eliminated,” he said on Wednesday.
At a memorial ceremony at a defence industry fair in Istanbul on Thursday, Guler said “no member of the treacherous terrorist organisation will be able to escape the grasp of Turkish soldiers.”
There was no immediate statement from the PKK. No group has claimed responsibility for the attack.
Security was tightened at the TUSAS headquarters on Thursday, with forces searching vehicles and checking people’s identities, state news agency Anadolu reported.
Funerals were held on Thursday for some victims of the attack.
Istanbul’s two main airports stepped up security, the DHA news agency and private NTV channel reported.
Sabiha Gokcen airport, which is located on the Asian side of the city, issued a statement telling passengers to arrive “at least three hours” early to avoid delays due to increased security.
The attack on TUSAS came a day after Devlet Bahceli – the leader of Turkey’s far-right Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) allied with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP) – raised the possibility that the PKK’s imprisoned leader Abdullah Ocalan could be granted parole if he renounces violence and disbands his organisation.
Erdogan said during a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin on the sidelines of a meeting of the BRICS developing economies in Russia that he condemned the “heinous terrorist attack”.
The Iraqi embassy in Ankara issued a statement condemning the attack.
It said it “affirms Iraq’s firm position in rejecting terrorism and extremism in all its forms and manifestations, and expresses the solidarity of Iraq’s government and people, with the government and people of the Republic of Turkey”. Earlier this year, Iraq announced a ban on the PKK.
Turkey regularly conducts air attacks against the PKK in Iraq and against a Kurdish group in Syria affiliated with the PKK.
The UAVs produced by TUSAS have been instrumental in Turkey gaining the upper hand in its fight against Kurdish fighters.
Ocalan’s group has been fighting for autonomy in southeastern Turkey in a conflict that has killed tens of thousands of people since the 1980s. It is considered a terrorist group by Turkey and its Western allies.
The country’s main pro-Kurdish DEM party, which also condemned the TUSAS attack, noted that it had occurred at a time when the possibility of a dialogue to end the conflict had emerged.
Reporting from Ankara, Al Jazeera’s Sinem Koseoglu said “many now question whether there is still room for peace.”
