03 March 2017•Update: 05 March 2017
MOSUL, Iraq
Speaking to local media in Erbil, Mir Tahsin Saied Beg, an Iraqi Ezidi leader, said Iraq’s northern Sinjar, Sinune and Hanesur districts should be placed under the control of the Kurdish Regional Government (KRG).
“We want the PKK to leave Sinjar,” he asserted.
In a statement published on the Democratic Party of Kurdistan’s official website, Sinjar District Governor Mahma Halil, for his part, said former Iraqi PM Nouri al-Malki had been involved in recent clashes between Peshmerga fighters and PKK terrorists.
“We will not close our eyes to the games being played in Sinjar,” Halil said.
“What does the PKK hope to achieve by remaining in Sinjar, which was recently retaken from the Daesh terrorist group?” he asked. “The PKK wants to destabilize the area.”
Late Thursday, four Syrian Peshmerga fighters and three PKK terrorists were injured in clashes between the two sides in Sinjar, located some 125 kilometers west of Mosul.
The PKK sees the deployment of Peshmerga forces near Sinjar -- which lies close to the Iraq-Syria border -- as an immediate threat.
In mid-2014, the PKK established a foothold in Sinjar on the pretext that it was fighting Daesh.
Syrian Peshmerga forces are drawn up largely from Syrian-Kurdish youth.
Numbering roughly 5,000, most have received military training in Erbil and Duhok in northern Iraq’s semi-autonomous Kurdish region.
*Ali Murat Alhas contributed to this report from Ankara
