Türkiye, Iraq have common will in fighting terrorism: Turkish ministry

By Serdar Dincel

ISTANBUL (AA) - Türkiye and Iraq have "an increasingly strong and common will in the fight against terrorism," Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Oncu Keceli said Thursday.

Keceli said on X that Iraq's designation of the PKK terrorist group as a "banned organization" and the signing in Ankara of a memorandum of understanding (MoU) on security, military and counterterrorism cooperation on Aug. 15 are products of this approach.

“Both countries are determined to ensure that this cooperation yields concrete results in the field and to increase the coordination between the competent authorities for this purpose," he said.

"Türkiye is fully committed to the fight against terrorism," Keceli added.

Stressing Ankara's decisiveness in combating terrorism, he said Türkiye continues to fight the terrorist organization based in Iraqi territory in accordance with the principle of self-defense outlined in Article 51 of the UN Charter.

Referring to a statement by Iraq's Joint Operations Command on an incident that took place earlier Thursday in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, Keceli noted that "coordination has been established with Iraqi authorities to fully clarify all details of the incident."

Earlier, the command issued a written statement saying that a drone which had crashed in Kirkuk early Thursday turned out to be a Turkish drone.

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

​​​​​​​The terrorist PKK is known for using northern Iraq, near the Turkish border, as a hideout to plot terror attacks and launch attacks on both Türkiye and locals in northern Syria.