No timetable to pull out troops from Iraq: Turkish official
Güncelleme Tarihi:
Turkey will not set a timetable to withdraw troops from northern Iraq until they have destroyed the rear-bases of Kurdish rebels, a senior Turkish official told reporters on Wednesday.
"There will be no timetable to withdraw Turkish troops from northern Iraq until the presence of the terrorist organisation is eliminated," Ahmet Davutoglu, the chief foreign policy advisor of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, said after crisis talks with Iraqi leaders in Baghdad He was referring to the PKK, which has waged a bloody campaign for self-rule in southeastern Turkey since 1984 and is also blacklisted as a terror group by the European Union and the United States.
"The PKKs presence in northern Iraq is unbearable for the Turkish government, Iraq and the international community," Davutoglu told a joint news conference with Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari. Zebari too condemned the PKK. "We condemn terrorism. We condemm the PKK but at the same time we condemn any violation of Iraqi sovereignty," he said, referring to Ankaras ground incursion into northern Iraq.