With Turkey poised for invasion in northern Iraq, the US faces a dilemma, writes Salah Hemeid When rebels of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) attacked again this week Turkish troops near the country's border with Iraq and Iran, killing at least 17 Turkish soldiers and wounding 17 more, their message was loud and clear: the guerrilla group is determined to continue its two-decade long bloody war against the Turkish army, regardless of the new regional crisis their campaign has triggered by using northern Iraq as a springboard for their attacks. Shortly after Sunday's attack in Hakkari Province, a wedding convoy tripped a landmine in Daglica, near the initial incident. At least one person was killed and eight others wounded when the mine exploded under their minibus. The Turkish government also blamed the bombing on PKK rebels. Both incidents prompted Turkey's political and military leaders to meet immediately to deal with the new crisis following Turkey's parliamentary approval of a motion authorising military strikes inside Iraq for a one-year period against PKK rebels. Under pressure from the US, Turkey's NATO ally, Ankara has deferred a widely expected push into northern Iraq to punish PKK guerrillas. Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan said after Sunday night's emergency cabinet meeting that US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had asked his government to wait. On Monday President George W Bush talked to Turkish President Abdullah Gul and promised to step up pressure on Iraqi leaders to work to counter the threat from the outlawed PKK against allied Turkey. The escalation is the latest in the war between Ankara and the separatist Kurdish group that has claimed the lives of 37,000 people. Ankara claims it has a legitimate right to stage a cross-border offensive against Kurdish rebels based in Iraq. It has threatened an incursion into Iraq unless Baghdad clamps down on the rebels on its territory and turns over PKK leaders. Ankara claims that some 3,500 PKK fighters have found shelter in Iraqi Kurdistan and are tolerated, or even actively supported, by Iraqi Kurdish leaders -- a charge the latter strongly deny. Addressing rising tension with Turkey, the Kurdish regional government rebuffed Ankara's threats and vowed to defend Iraqi Kurdistan if it is attacked by Ankara. Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, who is a Kurd, reiterated Sunday demands that PKK rebels lay down their arms and restated calls for a diplomatic solution. He also said Kurdish forces are unable to find the rebel leaders because of the difficult landscape. "The Turkish military, with its mightiness, could not annihilate them or arrest them, so how could we arrest them and hand them to Turkey?" Talabani also made it clear that the government of Kurdistan will not hand over Turkish Kurdish leaders to Ankara. "This is a dream which will not come true," he said. His remarks were echoed by the president of Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region, Masoud Barzani, who was alongside Talabani at the press conference vowing that Iraqi Kurds would defend their territories if attacked. Their hardline statements came after days of demonstrations of thousands of Kurds in northern Iraq's main cities to protest the vote by Turkey's lawmakers that backed possible cross-border attacks against Kurdish rebel camps. The official Iraqi position was far more modulated. Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki has called for talks with Turkey, and Vice-president Tariq Al-Hashimi travelled to Ankara last week to extend an olive branch to the Turks. A motion carried by a large majority in the Iraqi parliament Sunday condemned the decision by its Turkish counterpart but urged the Iraqi government to do more to rid the country of the PKK. "The parliament calls on PKK fighters to leave Iraqi territories and asks the Iraqi government to take the required measures to stop PKK activities being launched from Iraqi territories," the motion read. It was approved by 183 lawmakers of the 275-member National Assembly. The PKK has waged a bloody campaign for Kurdish self-rule in southeast Turkey since 1984 and occasionally established bases in remote rugged mountainous areas in neighbouring northern Iraq. During Saddam Hussein's rule, the two countries signed a security agreement that allowed Turkish troops to enter into northern Iraq to pursue the guerrillas. But since the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003, which empowered Iraqi Kurds and gave them full control of the northern region, Turkish Kurdish guerrillas further bolstered their position and increased their attacks against Turkey. If unresolved, Turkish threats push into northern Iraq will further destabilise the violence-torn country. Kurdish and other Iraqi leaders are already divided over the presence of the PKK on Iraqi territories with many government leaders in Baghdad showing increasing signs of impatience with Kurdish leaders for being lax in their treatment of PKK rebels and ignoring the central government in important decision-making issues regarding their federal region. In addition, the new crisis is expected to have tremendous regional ramifications, first by again putting the larger Kurdish issue on the Middle East's messy agenda, and second by increasing fear that ethnic and sectarian tension in Iraq might create a domino effect of chain reactions throughout the region. The Kurds are the fourth-largest ethnic group in the Middle East living mostly in Iraq, Turkey and Iran, with a small number in Syria. Although they are estimated at 25 million people, they have never had their own country, a fact that irks many Kurds. Such fears have already prompted some Arab countries to caution Turkey against attacking northern Iraq and urge Ankara to give diplomacy a chance. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, whose regime is already challenged by some two million Kurds, was quick to express support for Turkey. "As Syria, we are supporting all decisions by Turkey and we are standing behind them," said Al-Assad during a visit to Ankara last week. "We accept this as Turkey's legitimate right," he said, adding that US-led coalition forces were chiefly responsible for dealing with the guerrilla problem. Other Arab countries tend to strike a balance between both Turkey and the Kurds, avoiding estrangement of Iraqi Kurds that could fuel their separatist ambitions. Washington, as the occupying power in Iraq, feels that is facing a new dilemma. It has so far failed to resolve the issue by forcing PKK rebels out of Iraq for fear of alienating its Iraqi Kurdish friends. Washington has urged Turkey to work with Iraqis to crack down on the rebels, fearing a unilateral offensive by the Turks could bring chaos and a refugee crisis to one of the rare stable areas in Iraq. For its part, Turkey refers to the war on terror as justification for its potentially entering Iraq. Officials are also emphasising the protection of Turkey's unity and its citizens. As diplomacy is given a chance, some 100,000 Turkish soldiers are already posted on the border with Iraq waiting for orders to move. Their success to drive the PKK guerrilla out is not fully guaranteed, but if prolonged their offensive will mostly certainly add a new dimension to an already worsening situation in Iraq.
