Timeline of the Kurdistan Workers' Party insurgency (2015–present)
In late July 2015, the third phase of the Kurdish–Turkish conflict between various Kurdish insurgent groups and the Turkish government erupted, following a failed two and a half year-long peace process aimed at resolving the long-running conflict.
The conflict between Turkey and the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) broke out again in summer 2015 following two-year-long peace negotiations. These began in late 2012, but failed to progress in light of the growing tensions on the Turkish-Syrian border in late 2014, when the Turkish state prevented its Kurdish citizens from sending support to the People's Protection Units (YPG) who were fighting against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) during the Siege of Kobani. Turkey was accused of assisting the Islamic State during the siege,[23] resulting in the widespread 2014 Kurdish riots in Turkey involving dozens of fatalities.
In November 2015, Turkish authorities said that a number of towns and areas in the Eastern Anatolia Region had come under the control of PKK militants and affiliated armed organizations. According to Turkish government sources, between July 2015 and May 2016, 2,583 Kurdish insurgents were killed in Turkey and 2,366 in Iraq, as well as 483 members of the Turkish security forces.[24] The PKK said 1,557 Turkish security forces members were killed in 2015 during the clashes in Turkish and Iraqi Kurdistan, while it lost 220 fighters.[25] According to the International Crisis Group, 4,310 people, including 465 civilians, were killed in Turkey between July 2015 and December 2018,[12] including Kurdish lawyer Tahir Elçi.[26] In March 2017, the United Nations voiced "concern" over the Turkish government's operations and called for an independent assessment of the "massive destruction, killings and numerous other serious human rights violations" against the ethnic Kurdish minority.[27]
Since 2016, the Turkish military and Syrian National Army have conducted operations against the Syrian Democratic Forces, leading to the Turkish occupation of northern Syria.[28][29][30][31]
In May 2022, the conflict gained global geopolitical significance as Turkey opposed the accession of Finland and Sweden into NATO, accusing them of supporting the PKK.[32]
Belligerents[edit]
Turkish military and affiliates[edit]
Turkish Forces consisting of Turkish Land Forces troops, Gendarmerie operatives and Police Special Operations teams are backed by the rest of the Turkish Armed Forces. They are supported by a system of "village guards" which represent a feudal part of Turkey.[37] There have been recurring reports of the resurfacing Jitem "military police intelligence and anti-terrorist service" which had been responsible for massacres in the 1990s, and of irregular foreign jihadists, being employed.[38]
In 2016 the Turkish government of president Recep Tayyip Erdogan and the Justice and Development Party (AKP) were increasingly portraying the party they oppose as an enemy of an "islamic order", referring to the PKK and its affiliates and supporters as "atheists and Zoroastrians".[39][40][41]
PKK and affiliates[edit]
In 2008, according to information provided by the Intelligence Resource Program of the Federation of American Scientists the strength of the organization in terms of human resources consists of approximately 4,000 to 5,000 militants of whom 3,000 to 3,500 are located in northern Iraq.[42] With the new wave of fighting from 2015 onward, observers said that active support for the PKK had become a "mass phenomenon" in majority ethnic Kurdish cities in the Southeast of the Republic of Turkey, with large numbers of local youth joining PKK-affiliated local militant groups.[43]
According to Turkish estimates the PKK has a much larger size than the previously stated size standing at over 32,800 active fighters spanning across north-western Syria, south-eastern Turkey, northern Iraq and north-western Iran concentrated on the Qandil mountain range.[44]
PKK bases remain active in Northern Iraq and its leadership suspected in the Qandil Mountains in Iraq and Iran.[45][46] From the traditional preceding Turkish-PKK conflicts the PKK insurgency has transitioned into urban warfare in the country's densely populated south east.[47]
2020 timeline[edit]
October[edit]
On 26 October, two PKK militants ambushed the police in İskenderun and one of them detonated the bombs on him, injuring 1 police officer and 2 civilians.[372][373]
Overall, 12 people died, including 7 PKK militants, 2 security forces and 3 civilians.[335]
- On 14 April 2016, Nils Muiznieks, the council's human rights commissioner, said after visiting the city of Diyarbakir:[470]
Council of Europe
The European Parliament has been highly critical with respect to human rights abuses and denial of political dialogue with respect to the Kurdish issue under the cloak of fight against terrorism in Turkey.[470][473][474] The institutions of the European Union have persistently criticized the broad application of anti-terror legislation as well as a criminal law against "denigrating Turkishness" in Turkey as stifling peaceful advocacy for Kurdish rights.[475][476]
Conflict in Turkey's south-east has often reflected on Germany's Turkish and Kurdish minorities causing mass riots and the build up of ethnic tensions within Germany.[477]
However, the Turkish foreign ministry offered an open invitation to U.N. agencies to visit the country's southeastern provinces after the reports were made and refuted those statements, saying they were "based on insufficient information".[483] According to the UN Commissioner, unarmed civilians, including women and children, were shot by government snipers in the south-east during the clashes and Turkish forces also inflicted significant damage on the local infrastructure.[484] Turkish sources, whose reports were confirmed by the Turkey's foreign ministry had said in late 2015 that the PKK were hiring foreign national snipers to target civilians and high ranking Military personnel in the same region.[485]