Turkmen mobilization forces blow up Kurdish civilian’s house in Salahuddin
Iraqi army forces. Archival photo.
The Turkmen militias of al-Hashd al-Shaabi (Popular Mobilization Forces) blew up the house of a Kurdish civilian called Karim Ismail located at al-Joumhouri district on Wednesday evening, the activists said on social media platforms.
Meanwhile, an informed security source said Iraqi troops backed by PMFs invaded a house of a Peshmerga fighter on Wednesday evening in Lilan town, south of Kirkuk.
The fighter and his father, according to the source, were arrested and taken to unknown destination.
In related news, Kurdish media channels and eyewitnesses said on Thursday that both PMFs and army fighters resume their shelling against Kurdish villages at the boundaries of Tuz Khurmatu.
Troops have been shelling for two days the villages of Dawouda and Zinana towns, estimated at 13 villages of high Kurdish majority, the witnesses said.
News reports said hundreds of Kurdish villagers are likely to evacuate the towns. They previously evacuated Tuz Khurmatu in the wake of October incidents when Iraqi joint troops accessed the disputed regions between Baghdad and Erbil.
On Wednesday, huge reinforcements arrived from central and south of Iraq in preparation for operations against these villages.
On Tuesday, PMFs media service quoted Abu Reda al-Najjar, commander of the “northern axis” of the force’s operations, saying an operation against mainly Kurdish separatist groups in Salahuddin province’s restive region of Tuz Khurmatu s imminent to “clear the mountains overlooking Turkmen villages. He added that the offensive is targeting the “White Flags”, a nascent entity composed of a number of separatist groups, most notably the Kurdistan Free Life Party (PJAK), a militia fighting for Iranian Kurds’ independence.