Turkiye strikes Kurdish militant targets in Syria, Iraq for second day

Turkiye struck suspected Kurdish militant targets in Syria and Iraq for a second day on Thursday following an attack on the premises of a key defence company that killed at least five people the staterun news agency reportedThe National Intelligence Organisation targeted numerous strategic locations used by the Kurdistan Workers Party the PKK or by Syrian Kurdish militia that are affiliated with the militants the Anadolu Agency reportedThe targets included military intelligence energy and infrastructure facilities and ammunition depots the report said A security official said armed drones were used in Thursdays strikesOn Wednesday Turkiyes air force carried out airstrikes against similar targets in northern Syria and northern Iraq hours after government officials blamed the deadly attack at the headquarters of the aerospace and defense company TUSAS on the PKKDefence Minister Yasar Guler said on Thursday that 47 alleged PKK targets were destroyed in Wednesdays airstrikes 29 in Iraq and 18 in SyriaOur noble nation should rest assured that we will continue with increasing determination our struggle to eliminate the evil forces that threaten the security and peace of our country and people until the last terrorist disappears from this geography Guler saidThe assailants a man and a woman arrived at the TUSAS premises on the outskirts of Ankara in a taxi they commandeered after killing its driver reports saidArmed with assault rifles they set off explosives and opened fire killing four people at TUSAS including a security guard and a mechanical engineerSecurity teams were dispatched as soon as the attack started at around 330 pm the interior minister said The two assailants were also killed and more than 20 people were injured in the attackInterior Minister Ali Yerlikaya named the assailants as Mine Sevjin Alcicek and Ali Orek and identified them as PKK membersThere was no immediate statement from the PKK on the attack or the Turkish airstrikesIn Syria the main USbacked force said Turkish strikes in the north of the country killed 12 civilians and wounded 25The Kurdishled Syrian Democratic Forces said Turkish warplanes and drones struck bakeries power stations oil facilities and local police checkpointsAmir Samu an administrator at the al Swediya oil refinery in Derik northern Syria said overnight strikes at the facility resulted in the deaths of seven workers and guardsThey were all poor workers working in the refinery to make a living It is a civil institution not military or anything like that he saidSamu stated that al Swediya was the only refinery feeding the area The damage will have effects on diesel petrol and gas he saidTUSAS designs manufactures and assembles civilian and military aircraft unmanned aerial vehicles and other defense industry and space systems Its defence systems have been credited as key to Turkiye gaining an upper hand in its fight against Kurdish militantsThe attack occurred a day after the leader of Turkiyes farright nationalist party thats allied with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan raised the possibility that the PKKs imprisoned leader could be granted parole if he renounces violence and disbands his organisationAbdullah Ocalan who was captured in 1999 is serving a life sentence on a prison island off IstanbulIn a related development his nephew Omer Ocalan announced on the social platform X that on Wednesday family members were allowed to visit him for the first time since March 2020Omer Ocalan a lawmaker from Turkiyes proKurdish Peoples Equality and Democracy Party also conveyed a message from Abdullah Ocalan saying he was being kept in isolation and offering to work to end the conflict if the conditions are rightI have the theoretical and practical power to transform this process from one grounded in conflict and violence to one that is grounded on law and politics Omer Ocalan quoted his uncle as sayingThe PKK has been fighting for autonomy in southeastern Turkiye in a conflict that has killed tens of thousands of people since the 1980s It is considered a terrorist group by Turkiye and its Western alliesOn Thursday large crowds gathered in the courtyard of a mosque in Ankara to take part in the funeral prayers for three of the victims including Zahide Guclu an engineer who was part of a TUSAS helicopter projectShe was killed by the assailants after she had gone to the entrance of the complex to collect flowers sent by her husbandThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever