Turkish army says destroyed 60 PKK targets in raid
ANKARA (Reuters) - Turkish warplanes destroyed some 60 Kurdish guerrilla targets in northern Iraq during an operation this week, Turkey's General Staff said on Friday.
Tuesday's strikes on Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) positions in the mountainous region near Turkey's border followed a series of cross-border attacks by aircraft in December aimed at crushing the Turkish rebel group.
There have so far been no reports of casualties or damage caused by the latest raid on targets in the regions of Zap-Sivi, Avasin-Basyan and Hakurk.
"During the operation ... some 60 targets, confirmed as being used solely by the terror organization, came under fire from our warplanes," the General Staff said in a statement.
It said targets hit included command posts, shelters and training and logistics sites used by the guerrillas.
The General Staff said it was trying to assess the number of PKK casualties and would continue its operations.
Ankara says 3,000 PKK rebels are based in the northern Iraq mountains, from where they launch raids on Turkey. Some 100,000 Turkish troops are massed along the border with Iraq but Ankara is not expected to launch a major cross-border land incursion.
In a separate statement on Friday, the General Staff said 21 PKK rebels had surrendered to Turkish forces in the past month.
Turkey, the United States and the European Union class the PKK as a terrorist group. Ankara blames the group for the deaths of nearly 40,000 people since the PKK began its armed struggle for a Kurdish homeland in southeast Turkey in 1984.
Turkish forces shelled two areas in Dahuk on January 11, without causing significant damage or injury.
That shelling followed a January 3 bomb attack in the southeast Turkish city of Diyarbakir blamed on the PKK. The death toll in that bombing rose to seven on Friday after one of the casualties died in hospital from his injuries.
(Reporting by Daren Butler, editing by Tim Pearce)
