BAGHDAD: The Iraqi military on Thursday reported shooting down a Turkish drone over Kirkuk, a city in northern Iraq, as Turkiye continued its operations against Kurdish militants in the region.
Debris from the downed drone caused damage to a house in the city center, though there were no immediate reports of casualties. A police official said that a carpenter working nearby was hospitalized after falling from a height.
General Abdel Salam Ramadan, the deputy air defense commander for Kirkuk, confirmed the drone was intercepted while it was “penetrating Iraqi airspace,” having entered from the direction of Sulaimaniyah, a major city in the Kurdish autonomous region to the north.
Kirkuk and its surrounding oil fields are under direct federal administration from Baghdad and are not part of the Kurdish autonomous region. For the past 25 years, Turkiye has maintained several military bases in northern Iraq as part of its campaign against the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
Turkish forces frequently conduct operations against PKK targets, although the Turkish government typically comments on these actions infrequently.
The Iraqi federal government, which labeled the PKK a “banned organization” in March, recently agreed to a military cooperation deal with Turkiye. This agreement includes establishing joint training and command centers to combat the militants.
The PKK, which has been involved in a prolonged insurgency against Turkiye since 1984, is designated as a “terrorist organization” by Turkiye and its Western allies.
