ANKARA (Reuters) — Turkey’s military has begun deploying tanks and other armored vehicles to the town of Silopi near the Iraqi border, in a move the defense minister said on Tuesday was related to the fight against terrorism and developments across the border. Fikri Isik said Turkey had “no obligation” to wait behind its borders and would do what was necessary if Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants took a foothold in Iraq’s Sinjar region, about 115 kilometers south of Silopi. “We will not allow the threat to Turkey to increase,” he told broadcaster A Haber in an interview.
The army deployment, disclosed by military sources, came after President Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday that Turkey was aiming to reinforce its troops in Silopi. Photos from the sources showed a long column of vehicles, including tanks, tank rescue vehicles and construction vehicles in single file.
The deployment coincides with an Iraqi operation to drive the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) from the northern Iraqi city of Mosul and after Iraqi Shiite militias launched a related offensive to push the jihadists out of the town of Tal Afar further west. Erdogan said on Saturday Ankara would have a “different response” for Shiite militias if they “cause terror” in Tal Afar, home to a sizeable ethnic Turkmen population with historic and cultural ties to Turk