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AMADIYAH, Iraq (AFP) – Turkish troops, backed by fighter jets, closed in on a main rebel base in their offensive against Kurdish separatists in northern Iraq that has so far claimed at least 170 lives.
Regional security forces in the Kurdish-administered autonomous region reported sustained fighting overnight as Turkish soldiers advanced on the base in the Zap area.
The camp, situated in a deep valley just a six-kilometer (four-mile) walk from the Turkish border, has been identified by the military as a major staging post used by Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) rebels to launch attacks into Turkish territory.
The Turkish army says it has killed 153 rebels and lost 17 soldiers since it launched its cross-border incursion against PKK bases in northern Iraq.
PKK fighters suffered “heavy losses under fire from close quarters” as they tried to escape, the Turkish general staff said in a statement. Warplanes hit around 30 targets deep in northern Iraq on the route of the Turkish advance, it said.
Turkey’s President Abdullah Gul, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Army Chief Yasar Buyukanit joined thousands in Ankara Monday for the funeral of three soldiers slain in the offensive as mourners chanted anti-PKK slogans.
In Diyarbakir, the main city in the mainly Kurdish southeast of Turkey, up to 10,000 people spilled into the streets in protest against the government for ordering troops into northern Iraq.
Kurdistan Prime-Minister Nechirvan Barzani saying: “We don’t want to fight anyone, but if they fight us, we will defend ourselves.”
BAGHDAD (AP) 5 minutes ago — The Iraqi government denounced the Turkish incursion and demanded an immediate withdrawal of Turkish troops from northern Iraq.
Spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh said the military action was a violation of Iraqi sovereignty, and he called on the Turkish government to engage the Iraqis in dialogue instead.
“The Iraqi Cabinet has denounced the Turkish army’s incursion,” al-Dabbagh said in a televised statement after the government met to discuss the issue. ” The Cabinet calls on Turkey to withdraw its troops immediately and stop military interference.”
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WASHINGTON – The Pentagon is projecting that when the U.S. troop buildup in Iraq ends in July there will be about 8,000 more troops on the ground than when it began in January 2007, a senior general said.
Lt. Gen. Carter Ham, operations chief for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters that by July the troop total is likely to be 140,000. That compares with 132,000 when President Bush approved orders to send an additional five Army brigades to Iraq to improve security and avert civil war.
Ham stressed that his projected number of 140,000 is subject to change depending on security conditions, but it is the first time the Pentagon has publicly estimated what the total will be.
There currently are about 158,000 U.S. troops in Iraq.
Ham also announced that the Pentagon believes U.S. force levels in Afghanistan will stand at 32,000 in late summer, up from about 28,000 currently. The current total is the highest since the war began in October 2001, and another 3,200 Marines are scheduled to deploy to Afghanistan this spring.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
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The Gulf Daily News has a report claiming that the Iraqi deputy PM believes that proposed Iraq oil law will be signed into law shortly – just in time for the conference in Dubai that will carve up the “undiscovered oil” between the various international oil companies.
The International Herald Tribune has a letter from a French reader asking everyone to wake up and understand what this law really means – it means the Iraq invasion was about the oil.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
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WASHINGTON – Senate Republicans helped advance a Democratic-pushed bill to cut off money for the war in Iraq, saying the additional debating time would allow them to hail progress there.
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Gen. George Casey, the Army chief of staff, told a Senate panel he would not embrace going back to the longer tours even if President Bush decided to suspend troop reductions for the second half of the year. The Army is under serious strain from years of war-fighting, he testified, and must reduce the length of combat tours as soon as possible.
“The cumulative effects of the last six-plus years at war have left our Army out of balance, consumed by the current fight and unable to do the things we know we need to do to properly sustain our all-volunteer force and restore our flexibility for an uncertain future.”
Casey, who was the top U.S. commander in Iraq before taking the chief of staff job last spring, told the Senate Armed Services Committee that cutting the time soldiers spend in combat is an integral part of reducing the stress on the force.
He said he anticipates the service can cut combat tours from 15 months to 12 months this summer, as long as the president reduces the number of active-duty Army brigades in Iraq and Afghanistan to 15 units by July, as planned.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
And to think that one of our “allies” has invaded the country we’re occupying and, from the play it’s getting in the media, nobody seems to care.
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finally joined US as occupying force of the Iraq federal states. Northern Iraq is referred to as the Kurds and Kurd government. Only need to add -istan, claim independence and possession over the rich oil fields of Kirkuk.
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
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No, not the US invasion and occupation of Iraq, but our ally Turkey!
NEW DELHI (AP) — Defense Secretary Robert Gates said that Turkey should remove its troops from northern Iraq in the next few days, sending a strong message to Ankara that U.S. patience is running out on the operation targeting Kurdish insurgents.
Gates said he will ask Turkish leaders in a series of meetings to address some of the complaints of the Kurds, and move from combat to economic and political initiatives to solve differences with them.
“It’s very important that the Turks make this operation as short as possible and then leave,” Gates said late Wednesday from India before leaving. “They have to be mindful of Iraqi sovereignty. I measure quick in terms of days, a week or two, something like that, not months.”
A Turkish official insisted that the aim of a military incursion into northern Iraq “is clear and limited” against Kurdish rebels and said no timetable will be set “until the terrorist bases are eliminated.”
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."
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GENEVA – A report commissioned by the United Nations says Palestinian terrorism is the “inevitable consequence” of Israeli occupation – a claim Israel is rejecting as inflammatory.
The report – posted on the UN Human Rights Council’s website – says that while Palestinian terrorist acts are deplorable, “they must be understood as being a painful but inevitable consequence of colonialism, apartheid or occupation.”
The report accuses the Jewish state of acts and policies consistent with all three. As long as there is occupation, there will be terrorism, says the author, John Dugard.
Dugard is an independent investigator on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and a South African lawyer who campaigned against apartheid in the 1980s.
Dugard says in the report that “common sense … dictates that a distinction must be drawn between acts of mindless terror, such as acts committed by al-Qaida, and acts committed in the course of a war of national liberation against colonialism, apartheid or military occupation.”
The report calls for an end to the Israeli occupation, citing the country’s checkpoints and roadblocks restricting Palestinian movement, house demolitions and the “Judaization” of Jerusalem.
UNHRC Webcast
"But I will not let myself be reduced to silence."