Turkish PM postpones Iraq visit amid tensions in Kirkuk

"We, Iraq, Iran, and Turkey are going to come together soon to decide on new measures [against Kurdistan]," Yildirim said on Tuesday.

ERBIL, Kurdistan Region (Kurdistan 24) – A scheduled visit by Turkey’s Prime Minister Binali Yildirim to the Iraqi capital of Baghdad where he was to sit down with his counterpart Haider al-Abadi this weekend was postponed, said diplomatic sources in Ankara.

The postponement of Yildirim’s trip to Baghdad comes at a time of heightened tensions at the front lines south and west of the city of Kirkuk where Kurdish Peshmerga forces have been bracing for a possible military confrontation with Iranian-backed Iraqi militias.

In their meeting, Yildirim and Abadi were expected to talk about punitive measures including economic sanctions and possible joint military action against the Kurdistan Region which held a referendum last month on independence from Iraq.

Over 92 percent of voters approved the Kurdish quest for statehood on Sep. 25, giving a mandate to the Erbil government to initiate negotiations for an amicable secession from Iraq.

Kurdistan 24's Ankara bureau reported that Turkish diplomatic sources said Yildirim’s Baghdad trip was put off to a future date because of a “busy schedule.”

“We, Iraq, Iran, and Turkey are going to come together soon to decide on new measures [against Kurdistan],” Yildirim said on Tuesday during a speech to the parliamentary group of his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP).

Despite their shared objection to Kurdish aspirations, Baghdad and Ankara remain at odds regarding the presence of a contingent of the Turkish army in a base north of Mosul.

The Sunni-oriented regional policy of Turkey in much of the last decade during the ongoing civil war in Syria and the rise of the Islamic State (IS) in Iraq has led to an alienation with the Shia-dominated government in Baghdad.

Still, in a show of force to threaten Erbil following the referendum, the Turkish army and a small unit of Iraqi troops have been staging a joint military drill joined right across a vital commercial border crossing with the Region.

Earlier this month, Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan met with his Iranian counterpart Hassan Rouhani and the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Ali Khamenei in Tehran.

They reiterated their opposition to Kurdistan’s independence and vowed to work with Iraq to prevent it.

 

Editing by Karzan Sulaivany