Angry Iraq mourns death in shelling blamed on Turkey

Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhemi on Thursday declared a day of national mourning after nine holidaymakers were killed in the bombing of a Kurdish mountain village he blamed on neighboring Turkey.

The bodies were to be flown from the Kurdish regional capital of Arbil to Baghdad to be handed over to families for burial in their hometowns in southern and central Iraq, a Kurdish official said.

Shelling on Thursday in Parakh village in Zakho district also injured 23 people, most of them local tourists seeking respite from the heat of the plains in the mountains of Kurdish north.

The deaths in a village pleasure garden prompted several dozen angry demonstrators to protest in front of the Turkish visa office in Baghdad early Thursday, despite a massive police presence.

Patriotic songs blared from loudspeakers while protesters chanted slogans calling for the expulsion of Turkey’s ambassador, an AFP journalist reported.

“We want to burn down the embassy. The ambassador must be expelled,” said protester Ali Yassin, 53. “Our government is doing nothing.”

Similar protests erupted Wednesday night in the Shia holy cities of Najaf and Karbala, and in the southern city of Nasiriyah.

In an unusually harsh rebuke, the prime minister on Wednesday warned Turkey that Iraq reserves the “right to retaliate” and called the artillery barrage a “blatant violation” of sovereignty — a line echoed by the north’s autonomous regional government.

Iraq said it was recalling its charge d’affaires from Ankara and demanding an official apology from Turkey and “the withdrawal of its forces from all Iraqi territory.”

Turkey’s Foreign Ministry denied responsibility for the bombing, saying these “types of attacks” were carried out by “terrorist organizations”.

Ankara launched an offensive in northern Iraq called Operation Claw-Lock in April, targeting Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) fighters.

The PKK has maintained a deadly pro-Kurdish self-government insurgency in southeastern Turkey since 1984, and Ankara and its western allies blacklist the group as a “terrorist organization.”

Over the past 25 years, the Turkish army has maintained dozens of outposts in Iraq’s Kurdish north as part of its campaign against the rebels. There have been sporadic calls for their removal.

Iraq and Turkey are important trading partners, but Ankara’s successive offensives against PKK bases in the north have been a persistent thorn in the relationship.