Turkish Intelligence 'neutralizes' PKK's logistical ringleader in northern Iraq

By Orhan Onur Gemici

ANKARA (AA) – The Turkish Intelligence Organization (MIT) has "neutralized" the terrorist group PKK’s logistical ringleader as part of Operation Claw-Lock in northern Iraq, security sources told Anadolu.

Cahit Aktay, codenamed Huseyin Piran, was responsible for planning a 2016 attack in Türkiye’s southeastern Sirnak province which killed three soldiers and two village guards.

Aktay, who was found to be plotting attacks on security forces and working to smuggle weapons and ammunition, was neutralized with a "pinpoint" operation organized by MIT, said the sources, who asked not to be named due to restrictions on speaking to the media.

Turkish authorities use the term "neutralize" to imply that the terrorists in question surrendered or were killed or captured.

Aktay joined the rural ranks of the terrorist PKK in 2008 and was in the Qandil region of northern Iraq, where the terrorist group is based, from 2009 to 2012.

In 2012-2015, Aktay moved to the Kato Jirka region and was eventually named the terrorist PKK’s logistical ringleader in Kato in 2015.

In 2016, Aktay, heading the Kato mobile unit, ordered the placement of landmines along a military convoy route in Sirnak, killing three soldiers and two village guards.

In 2018, Aktay became the unit ringleader in Makhmur, northern Iraq, and in 2019, he began to operate as the terrorist PKK’s financial and logistical ringleader in the Metina region.

Türkiye launched Operation Claw-Lock in 2022 to target the PKK terror organization’s hideouts in northern Iraq’s Metina, Zap, and Avasin-Basyan regions near the Turkish border, where members of the group hide and plot attacks.

In its more than 35-year terror campaign against Türkiye, the PKK – listed as a terrorist organization by Türkiye, the US and EU – has been responsible for the deaths of more than 40,000 people, including women, children and infants.