Turkey’s PKK Conflict: A Visual Explainer

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Context: Turkey’s conflict with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) – recognised as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the U.S. and the EU – continues in south-eastern Turkey and northern Iraq. In northern Syria, Ankara and the PKK’s Syrian affiliate, the People’s Protection Forces (YPG), remain pitted against each other. On the home front, the government is pursuing crackdown on the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP).

Battleground: Between 20 November-20 December the intensity of Turkish military operations targeting PKK militants in rural areas of Turkey’s south east winded down further. This reflects a usual seasonal dip due to harsher winter conditions in mountainous areas where fighting takes place. Turkish operations in northern Iraq, including air raids, continued. Three civilians were reportedly killed in a Turkish drone strike in the Amedi region on 7 December. Tensions between the KDP and PKK/YPG in northern Iraq reached a high point this month. On 16 December, KDP peshmerga forces clashed with members of the YPG in the Sihela area of Ninawa province.

Analysis: Prospects for non-violent ways forward look bleak amid uncertainty in Syria, Iraq and the Turkish political leadership’s reliance on support from nationalists at home.