LadyMod at scam.com
11-01-2007, 11:44 AM
Turkey denies closing air space to northern Iraq flights (http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5jLGOAuUMEPPn6hJnPKHBqeApSQOA)
3 hours ago
ANKARA (AFP) — Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday denied that his country had closed its air space to planes bound for northern Iraq as part of economic sanctions over the safe haven Kurdish rebels enjoy in the region.
"There is no such decision," the Anatolia news agency quoted Erdogan as saying.
The NTV news channel had earlier reported that Turkey had closed its air space to planes bound for the autonomous Kurdish-held north of Iraq, which Ankara accuses of harbouring the separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said Ankara had already started imposing some sanctions against northern Iraq, but gave no details.
"We have from time to time restricted flights on technical grounds, this might happen again," Babacan told a press conference.
Turkey says some 3,500 PKK rebels use northern Iraq as a springboard for cross-border attacks into Turkey as part of their 23-year campaign for self-rule in the country's mainly Kurdish southeast.
A travel agent here told AFP that there were at least two airlines operating flights from Istanbul to Arbil and Sulaimaniyah, northern Iraq: Iraq Airlines and Tarhan Tower Airlines, which uses planes it charters from the Turkish firm Atlas Jet.
A number of companies based in western Europe have also recently begun flying to destinations in Iraqi Kurdistan, the agent said.
On October 15, Turkey suspended the overflight license of a German airline running charters to northern Iraq because passengers were reportedly sold tickets under the "Kurdistan Airlines" label.
"The authorities are assessing whether or not to renew the company's license, which expired on September 30," a foreign ministry official then told AFP.
He said there were allegations that the company, Hamburg International, was being "used as a front" by Kurdish separatists and that passengers flying to Arbil, capital of Iraq's Kurdish autonomous region, were sold "Kurdistan Airlines" tickets.
In Turkey, the term Kurdistan is a politically charged reference to Kurdish-majority areas in southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq.
Ankara suspects the Iraqi Kurds, who enjoy autonomy in northern Iraq, of harbouring designs to proclaim an independent Kurdish state, in a development that might fan unrest among Turkey's Kurdish community.
Ankara is threatening a military incursion into northern Iraq to wipe out PKK bases there unless Baghdad and Washington take urgent, decisive steps to end the rebels' safe haven in the area.
Turkey has massed an estimated 100,000 troops on the border with Iraq for an eventual incursion it hopes will end the PKK campaign that has claimed more than 37,000 lives since it began in 1984.
.
3 hours ago
ANKARA (AFP) — Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday denied that his country had closed its air space to planes bound for northern Iraq as part of economic sanctions over the safe haven Kurdish rebels enjoy in the region.
"There is no such decision," the Anatolia news agency quoted Erdogan as saying.
The NTV news channel had earlier reported that Turkey had closed its air space to planes bound for the autonomous Kurdish-held north of Iraq, which Ankara accuses of harbouring the separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said Ankara had already started imposing some sanctions against northern Iraq, but gave no details.
"We have from time to time restricted flights on technical grounds, this might happen again," Babacan told a press conference.
Turkey says some 3,500 PKK rebels use northern Iraq as a springboard for cross-border attacks into Turkey as part of their 23-year campaign for self-rule in the country's mainly Kurdish southeast.
A travel agent here told AFP that there were at least two airlines operating flights from Istanbul to Arbil and Sulaimaniyah, northern Iraq: Iraq Airlines and Tarhan Tower Airlines, which uses planes it charters from the Turkish firm Atlas Jet.
A number of companies based in western Europe have also recently begun flying to destinations in Iraqi Kurdistan, the agent said.
On October 15, Turkey suspended the overflight license of a German airline running charters to northern Iraq because passengers were reportedly sold tickets under the "Kurdistan Airlines" label.
"The authorities are assessing whether or not to renew the company's license, which expired on September 30," a foreign ministry official then told AFP.
He said there were allegations that the company, Hamburg International, was being "used as a front" by Kurdish separatists and that passengers flying to Arbil, capital of Iraq's Kurdish autonomous region, were sold "Kurdistan Airlines" tickets.
In Turkey, the term Kurdistan is a politically charged reference to Kurdish-majority areas in southeastern Turkey and northern Iraq.
Ankara suspects the Iraqi Kurds, who enjoy autonomy in northern Iraq, of harbouring designs to proclaim an independent Kurdish state, in a development that might fan unrest among Turkey's Kurdish community.
Ankara is threatening a military incursion into northern Iraq to wipe out PKK bases there unless Baghdad and Washington take urgent, decisive steps to end the rebels' safe haven in the area.
Turkey has massed an estimated 100,000 troops on the border with Iraq for an eventual incursion it hopes will end the PKK campaign that has claimed more than 37,000 lives since it began in 1984.
.