Ankara/Baghdad: Turkey's military said it attacked Kurdish separatists in northern Iraq on Saturday for the third time in less than a week, bombing and shelling positions and warning more will follow.
"Turkish aircraft attacked between 1.35pm and 2pm major positions of the terrorist organisation" Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), before Turkish artillery shelled the area for 15 minutes, the military said in a statement on its website.
It gave no details on targets, saying more information would be given next week and that it would carry out more operations despite harsh winter conditions in the mountainous region.
The Turkish television channel NTV said the raids were in the Amadiyah area of northern Iraq.
"It will become well understood how effective the operations against the terrorist operations are," the military's statement said. PKK "no longer has a chance of success" against the Turkish army.
Actions over recent weeks had left "hundreds of terrorists" dead, it added.
Kurd leader visits
Kurdish leader Masoud Barzani on Sundayb visited refugees who had fled border areas of northern Iraq after Turkish air strikes pounded areas close to their villages late on Saturday.
Barzani, the president of Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region, strongly condemned the attacks and renewed calls for a peaceful solution.
"These daily strikes are unacceptable .... Their goal is not only PKK but the whole idea of an autonomous Kurdish region," he told a group of families, in comments broadcast on his party's Kurdistan TV channel.
"The problem is not solved militarily and we are prepared for all peaceful solutions. I have come here to thank you for your patience and assure you that we will rebuild the border areas and the situation will not remain this way," he said.
Kurdish security forces said Saturday's aerial bombardment caused no casualties because the area was largely evacuated in anticipation of Turkish military action. Turkey said its warplanes had bombed separatist PKK rebel positions inside Iraq. Over the past three months, Turkey, which has massed up to 100,000 troops near its border with Iraq, has carried out occasional air and artillery strikes and small-scale raids by ground forces across the border against PKK targets.
Ankara blames PKK for the deaths of nearly 40,000 people since the group began its rebellion in 1984. PKK wants Kurdish self-rule in southeast Turkey.
In northern Iraq, Jabbar Yawar, spokesman for the Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga security force, said Turkish warplanes had hit isolated Kurdish villages.
"In the afternoon Turkish warplanes entered northern Iraqi airspace in an area called Al Amadiyah. Later around 4pm they bombed Iraqi Kurdish villages. We do not know the extent of damage. But these areas are largely deserted and are along the border with Turkey," Yawar told AFP.
Turkey has been stepping up pressure since its parliament approved in October cross-border raids on PKK bases, with Ankara saying the Iraqi government and its US backers were not doing enough to halt PKK attacks.
State Department spokeswoman Nicole Thompson said in Washington: "The United States does view PKK as a terrorist group and is against any acts of violence against Turkey or Iraq.
"It will continue to work with the governments of Turkey and Iraq on how they can work together to deal with PKK."
