Turkey hits Kurdish militant targets in Iraq

Turkish warplanes carried out new airstrikes against suspected Kurdish militant sites in northern Iraq on Tuesday, days after a suicide attack in the Turkish capital. Police, meanwhile, detained almost 1,000 people in raids across Turkey.

A defense ministry statement said the air raids hit 16 targets, including caves, shelters and depots, used by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK in the neighboring region. It said the operation aimed to protect Turkey's borders and prevent terror attacks.

It was Turkey's second cross-border aerial operation against PKK targets in northern Iraq since the attack in Ankara on Sunday.

Earlier, police conducted raids in several Turkish provinces, detaining close to 1,000 people, including dozens with alleged links to Kurdish militants. An opposition news anchor was also briefly detained.

Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya said that 55 people suspected of being part of the PKK's “intelligence structure” were detained in 16 provinces. At least 12 other suspected PKK members were rounded up in a separate operation in five provinces, Yerlikaya wrote on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.

The PKK claimed responsibility for the suicide attack, according to a news website close to the group. The group has led a decades-long insurgency in Turkey and is considered a terror organization by the United States and the European Union. Tens of thousands of people have died since the start of the conflict in 1984.

The interior minister later said that an additional 928 people suspected of holding unlicensed firearms or being connected to firearms smuggling were arrested during the operation, but he didn't immediately make it clear if the suspects arrested for illegal firearms were suspected of connections to the PKK.

He added that more than 840 firearms were confiscated during the operation.

A 73-year-old news anchor was also briefly detained Tuesday after she questioned details of the official account of the attack on opposition broadcaster Halk TV.

Aysenur Arslan was detained in her home after prosecutors accused her of “terrorist propaganda” and “praising criminal activity” for comments made during her television program on Monday morning.

Media freedoms in Turkey have eroded during President Recep Tayyip Erdogan `s tenure, according to international monitors.