Dozens of Kurdish families desert homes due to Turkish bombardment

SULAIMANIYA / IraqiNews.com: Dozens of Kurdish families have deserted their villages in northern Iraq’s Kurdistan’s Qandil mountains because of the Turkish bombardment of their areas, under charges of chasing the positions of the anti-Ankara Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), military and civilian sources in Sulaimaniya reported on Saturday. “The Turkish bombardment has forced the inhabitants of about 10 Kurdish villages, along with the destruction of their houses and farms,” the Mayor of Saidakan village, 33 km to the east of Soran township in Sulaimaniya Province, Ahmed Qader-Sour told IraqiNews.com news agency. He said that the villages in Qandil Mountains have been targets for the Turkish bombardment that began at 07:00 PM local time on Friday and continued till Saturday morning, along with Iranian bombardment, causing no human casualties among the PKK members, but for material damage. “The bombardment had stopped this morning, but large numbers of inhabitants have fled their home villages, to escape being hurt by the bombardment,” he said. Several northern Iraq’s Kurdistan villages of Arbil and Duhuk Provinces have witnessed continued Turkish air raids over the past two days, to attack positions of the PKK, who had launched attacks against Turkish Army units, killing and wounding about 30 Turkish soldiers, according to Turkish Army sources. SKH (TI)/SR 619