Turkish warplanes bombed Kurdish guerrilla targets in
northern Iraq on Wednesday in their fourth such cross-border raid in
five days, Turkey''s general staff said on Wednesday.
The Turkish military said its offensive against outlawed separatist Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) guerrillas inside Turkey and across the border in
northern Iraq would continue.
"Fighter jets belonging to the Turkish armed
forces successfully hit targets belonging to the terrorist organization in the early hours of December 26," the General Staff said in a statement, adding eight PKK hideouts were hit in the Zap valley.
Jabbar Yawar, spokesman for Peshmerga security forces of Iraq''s semi-autonomous Kurdish region, said the strike lasted about an hour in a mountainous border region of Dahuk province but inflicted no casualties.
Turkey says it has the right to use force to combat separatist rebels who take shelter in the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of northern Iraq and mount attacks in which they have killed dozens of Turkish troops in recent months.
Turkish aircraft also struck targets across northern Iraq on Saturday, Sunday and Tuesday, the latest salvoes in a campaign that began with a larger bombing raid on Dec. 16. Up to several hundred ground troops as well as long-range artillery have also been involved in the brief cross-border raids.
Turkey says its strikes are aimed at PKK guerrillas based in northern Iraq. Hundreds of civilians have fled villages in the border area.
The Iraqi government and U.S. forces say they support Turkey''s right to strike back at PKK militants but want any action to be coordinated with them and small in scale to avoid destabilizing northern Iraq.
The United States is providing NATO-member Turkey with intelligence on the PKK in northern Iraq.
Ankara blames the PKK -- considered a terrorist organization by Turkey, the United States and the European Union -- for the deaths of nearly 40,000 people since it began an armed struggle for a separate Kurdish homeland in 1984.
Turkey says some 3,000 PKK fighters are based in camps in northern Iraq.