Turkish military air raids kill 160 PKK members
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Xinhua, August 30, 2011
The general staff of the Turkish Armed Forces said on Monday they have killed an estimated 145 to 160 members of the outlawed Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) and injured at least 100 others in the past three days.
The general staff said in a statement that Turkish jets conducted "21 effective sorties" between Aug. 25 and 28 in northern Iraq, targeting PKK camps in Zap and Gara regions.
The military said the intelligence aerial vehicles had identified possible PKK targets between Aug. 23 and 24, before the air raids.
The statement added that 38 targets were heavily shelled in coordination with air raids during the cross-border operation in the same period.
The military said all targets were carefully pinpointed through repeated reconnaissance flights before the operations and that the military had taken necessary precautions to avoid civilian casualties.
The military said Tuesday that air strikes on suspected PKK targets in northern Iraq between Aug. 17 and 22 killed an estimated 90 to 100 PKK members and warned that it would press ahead with offensives against the PKK group both inside Turkey and across the border.
Listed as a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union, the PKK took up arms in 1984 to create an ethnic homeland in southeastern Turkey. More than 40,000 people have been killed in conflicts involving the PKK during the past over two decades.
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