Turkish airstrikes hit PKK positions in Kurdistan’s Duhok

Shafaq News/ Turkish airstrikes targeted positions of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in northern Duhok, Kurdistan Region, a security source in the province reported on Thursday.

The source told Shafaq News, “The airstrikes directly targeted the old Sikeri village, situated on the slopes of Matin Mountain, overlooking the Al-Amadiya district.” The village had been evacuated years ago due to ongoing military confrontations between the Turkish army and the PKK, designated a terrorist organization by Ankara.

Recently, PKK fighters have reportedly adopted a new tactic of taking refuge and fortifying themselves inside abandoned villages. "This has made these villages frequent targets of Turkish airstrikes, leading to their complete or partial destruction and complicating the return of original residents in the future," he added.

On Tuesday, Turkish artillery bombarded PKK locations in Mount Gara, north of Duhok. Additionally, several airstrikes hit other sites, including a cave near a palace built during Saddam Hussein’s regime in the late 1980s, on a peak of the same mountain.

A day earlier, a Turkish drone strike targeted a Toyota Land Cruiser on the main road in Kardajan village, killing four civilians—two men and two women—and injuring one other, according to the US-based Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) organization. Turkish artillery strikes also targeted the Aqrah district in northern Duhok, resulting in the death of a man and his wife, a government source affirmed.