Turkey Kurdish raids: Operation Claw-Sword targets militant bases

Turkey has launched air-raids connected Kurdish targets successful Iraq and Syria, a week aft a bombing successful Istanbul which it blames connected Kurdish militants.

The raids - dubbed Operation Claw-Sword - struck Kurdish bases which were being utilized to motorboat attacks connected Turkey, the defence ministry said.

A Syrian-Kurdish spokesperson said 2 villages populated with internally displaced radical were hit.

The banned Kurdish PKK radical denies carrying retired the Istanbul attack.

As the air-raids began, the Turkish defence ministry tweeted that the "hour of reckoning" had arrived, alongside a representation of a combatant level taking disconnected and footage of an explosion.

"Terrorists' shelters, bunkers, caves, tunnels, and warehouses were successfully destroyed," said Turkey's Defence Minister Hulusi Akar. The Turkish defence ministry aboriginal said the strikes connected Kurdish militant bases successful bluish Syria and bluish Iraq destroyed 89 targets.

Kurdish-led forces successful Syria vowed to retaliate and said the metropolis of Kobane was deed arsenic good arsenic 2 densely populated villages.

At slightest 31 radical were killed successful bluish Syria alone, according to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

It is not wide which targets were deed successful Iraq.

The raids travel a week aft a bombing connected 1 of Istanbul's busiest streets which killed six radical and injured much than 80.

Turkish authorities blamed the bombing connected the Kurdish militant radical the PKK, which Turkey, the EU and US respect arsenic a violent organisation.

However, the PKK said it would not "directly people civilians" and denied responsibility.

Authorities person arrested dozens of radical successful transportation with the onslaught including a Syrian pistillate who they accidental planted the bomb.

Before the arrest, the Turkish justness curate said a container had exploded adjacent a seat aft a pistillate sat determination for forty minutes.

Five radical person besides been charged successful Bulgaria implicit the attack, according to the AFP quality agency.

Kurdish militants person been battling for decades to execute Kurdish self-rule successful south-east Turkey.

In caller years, Turkey has conducted a fig of cross-border operations targeting Kurdish groups based successful bluish Iraq and Syria, aiming to forestall attacks connected Turkish territory.