Turkey extends motion for cross-border operations in northern Iraq, Syria
The motion enables Ankara to authorise military action in Syria and northern Iraq to fight any group threatening the country for two more years.
Turkey has launched a trio of successful anti-terror operations across its border in northern Syria since 2016 to prevent the formation of a terror corridor and enable the peaceful settlement of residents.
Turkey's parliament has approved a motion to extend the state’s authority to launch cross-border military operations in northern Iraq and Syria for two more years.
The governing Justice and Development (AK) Party, Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), and the opposition Good Party (IYI) backed the motion.
The main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), and the Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), however, voted against the motion.
The motion, referred to parliament by the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, would allow the Turkish military to carry out cross-border operations in northern Iraq and Syria for two more years, from October 30, 2021, until October 30, 2023.
The motion stated that the risks and threats posed by ongoing conflicts near Turkey's southern land borders "continue to rise."
Turkey's military operations
Since 2016, Turkey’s Euphrates Shield, Olive Branch and Peace Spring operations in northwestern Syria have liberated the region from YPG/PKK and Daesh terrorists, making it possible for Syrians who fled the violence to return home.
Turkey has long decried the threat from terrorists east of the Euphrates River in northern Syria, pledging military action to prevent the formation of a "terrorist corridor" there.
PKK terrorist group often uses bases in northern Iraq just across Turkey’s southern border to plot attacks in Turkey.
Turkey has also carried out a series of offensives since 2019 against terrorist groups in northern Iraq, particularly the PKK.
The latest ones are Pence-Simsek and Pence-Yildirim launched this April in the Metina and Avasin-Basyan regions, while operations Pence-Kaplan and Pence-Kartal were initiated in June last year.
In its more than 30-year terror campaign against Turkey, the PKK, listed as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the US and the EU, has been responsible for the deaths of some 40,000 people, including women, children and infants.
YPG is the Syrian branch of the PKK terror organisation.
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