Ankara, Feb. 8, 2021 – Turkey’s Interior Ministry on Monday said the country had launched a new operation aimed at combating Kurdish separatist movements in the country’s southern regions.
The state news agency, Anadolu, quoted the ministry as saying that over 1,600 personnel from the gendarmerie, police, and village guards were mobilised in 96 teams as part of Operation Eren-8 Amanoslar.
The operations will span the provinces of Osmaniye, Hatay and Gaziantep, all bordering Syria’s northwest.
This is in addition to the seven other anti-terrorist operations underway in the country’s heavily Kurdish eastern provinces.
Ankara has waged war with Kurdish groups, especially the leftist Kurdish Workers’ Party, for over 40 years, accusing them of terrorist campaigns that have cost tens of thousands of lives.
About 15 per cent of Turkey’s population is Kurdish and Ankara is quick to quash any separatist ambitions of the world’s largest stateless people. (Sputnik/NAN)
