PKK, exclude more talks with Iraq and Turkey
Ankara (AsiaNews/Agencies) - Turkish and Iraqi officials say there are no plans for further talks between Turkey and an Iraqi delegation visiting Ankara to seek an agreement on cracking down on Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) guerrillas based in northern Iraq.
The news – given by anonymous government sources comes one day Turkey rejected a series of proposals offered by a high-level Iraqi delegation, led by Defence Minister General Abdel Qader Jassim, as insufficient and taking too long to take effect. The officials said the Iraqi delegation, which included U.S. military and Iraqi Kurdish regional government officials, would leave Turkey around midday.
Baghdad had offered proposals that included cutting logistical support to the PKK, limiting their movements and closing offices linked to them. But Ankara wants PKK guerrillas, including their leaders, handed over and for their camps in northern Iraq to be shut down. Iraq says it has no control over the separatist fighters.
The Iraqi-Turkish talks came ahead of U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice's visit to Ankara on November 2 to discuss the crisis and before a regional conference in Istanbul on November 2-3, where foreign ministers will discuss Iraq. Ankara is pushing for a joint military operation with the United States, but the commander of US forces in Iraq, General Benjamin Mixon, has warned that the American military will do “absolutely nothing” regarding the conflict.
Turkey has already massed up to 100,000 troops on the frontier before a possible cross-border operation against about 3,000 PKK guerrillas, who have stepped up deadly attacks into Turkey from Iraq, targeting Turkish soldiers.
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