Kurdish Peshmerga Member Killed in Turkish Drone Strike in Iraqi Kurdistan: Ankara's Continued Military Operations Against PKK
A Kurdish Peshmerga member was killed by a Turkish drone strike in the autonomous Kurdistan region of northern Iraq on Friday.
Ankara frequently conducts military operations in the area against the outlawed PKK, a Kurdish separatist group that has been waging an insurgency against Turkey for decades.
The victim died when his vehicle was hit in a drone attack, according to Ihsan Chalabi, the mayor of Sidakan district.
Turkey has had military bases in northern Iraq for decades as part of its war against the PKK, with both the Iraqi government and the Kurdish regional government accused of allowing these activities to maintain close economic ties with Turkey.
In early April, a senior military figure from the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) was reportedly killed by a Turkish drone strike in the Sinjar region of Iraq.
This comes ahead of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's expected visit to Baghdad on Monday, his first official trip to Iraq since 2011.
Despite previous rulings out of joint military operations against the PKK, Iraq's Defense Minister Thabet Al-Abassi mentioned plans for establishing a joint intelligence coordination center between Turkey and Iraq.