Turkiye hit 471 Kurdish targets in Iraq and Syria, says minister

Turkish Defence Minister Hulusi Akar said on Wednesday that the country’s armed forces have hit 471 Kurdish targets in northern Iraq and Syria as part of the ongoing campaign in the area, Anadolu has reported. Akar added that “254 terrorists were neutralised in the operation.”

Turkiye launched a series of air strikes as part of Operation Claw-Sword against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in northern Iraq, and the PKK-affiliated Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Syria. The campaign was in response to a bombing in Istanbul on 13 November that killed six people and injured dozens more, for which both organisations have denied responsibility.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said yesterday that a ground operation in northern Syria will take place “soon”.

The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, meanwhile, confirmed that the Turkish air strikes resulted in around forty people being killed. It added that Turkish artillery bombed the city of Kobani, the stronghold of the YPG, on Tuesday evening.

READ: Turkish air strikes target Kurdish militants in Syria, Iraq after bomb attack