Turkish opposition leader says Erdogan uses war against IS as cover

Turkish opposition leader says Erdogan uses war against IS as cover

PanARMENIAN.Net -

The leader of Turkey's pro-Kurdish opposition accused President Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday, July 30, of launching air strikes in Syria and Iraq to prevent Kurdish territorial and political gains, and of using the war against Islamic State as a cover, Reuters reports.

Turkey launched near-simultaneous air strikes on Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) camps in northern Iraq and Islamic State fighters in Syria last Friday, in what Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has called a "synchronised fight against terror".

In an interview with Reuters, Selahattin Demirtas, leader of Turkey's pro-Kurdish Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP), said the main aim of the campaign was not to combat Islamist jihadists but to prevent Kurds from unifying areas they control in Syria.

"Turkey carried out a couple of air strikes against Islamic State just for show, without causing serious damage to it, nor is Islamic State feeling serious pressure from Turkey," he said. "Turkey's operations do not aim at taking measures against Islamic State. The main objective is to prevent the formation of a Kurdish entity in northern Syria."

Demirtas led the HDP into a parliamentary election in June at which it seized enough seats to deprive the AK Party, founded by Erdogan, of a working majority for the first time in more than a decade. The left-wing HDP gained traction after Demirtas campaigned on a progressive platform that took the party beyond its origins in Kurdish nationalism, appealing to a broader range of minorities and opponents of the Islamist-rooted AKP.

Erdogan was taking Turkey to war in revenge, Demirtas said, seeking to discredit the Kurdish movement ahead of a possible repeat election. The AKP is in talks to find a junior coalition partner, but should it fail, Erdogan could call a fresh vote at which he hopes the AKP would win back its majority.

"The AK Party is dragging the country into a period of conflict, seeking revenge for the loss of its majority in the June election," Demirtas said. "HDP passing the threshold and the AK Party losing its parliamentary majority are being used as a pretext for war."

"Erdogan stressed in the past that they would never allow the unification of Kurdish cantons in northern Syria. Jarablus is the only obstacle for this unity," Demirtas said, referring to a Syrian town on the edge of the proposed "safe zone".

Turkish officials have said the aim in Syria is to push Islamic State away from the border and their operations will not target Syrian Kurdish groups. They say the strikes against PKK camps in northern Iraq, meanwhile, are a response to increased militant violence in recent weeks, including a series of targeted killings of police officers and soldiers blamed on the Kurdish militant group.

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