Why Türkiye sends a strong warning to Talabani’s PUK in northern Iraq

Northern Iraq’s internal politics has long been dominated by two rival Kurdish parties – the Erbil-based KDP and Sulaymaniyah-based PUK, both of which have jointly led the current Kurdish Regional Government (KRG) since the US invasion in 2003.

While the Massoud Barzani-led KDP has long opposed the PKK’s presence in northern Iraq, the PUK – dominated by the powerful Talabani family – has occasionally turned a blind eye to the terror group’s activities in the region.

Barzani, the leading member of the Barzani family, had previously been the president of the KRG while PUK founder Jalal Talabani, who became the Iraqi president after the US invasion, was the most prominent member of the political clan before his death in 2017. Now, his son Bafel Talabani leads the PUK.

The PKK, which is recognised as a terror group by Türkiye, the US, the EU and NATO, has been involved in a decades-long terror campaign against Ankara, leading to the death of tens of thousands of people, including women and children.

On January 25, PKK launched rocket attacks on the KDP’s Peshmerga forces in Duhok, a city under KDP’s control, signalling growing tensions between the terror group and the Kurdish regional administration in Erbil.

The KDP presides over northwestern Iraq, including Erbil and Duhok, while the PUK controls northeastern Iraq, including Sulaymaniyah.

The PUK’s passive acceptance of PKK's presence in northern Iraq has recently evolved into an active cooperation between the two groups. Bafel Talabani publicly endorsed the YPG, the PKK’s Syrian wing, meeting the terror group’s military leader, Mazlum Kobani.

But analysts say that PUK’s active collaboration with the PKK is risking Ankara’s rage over the northern Iraqi Kurdish party and its leaders.

“We won't hesitate to take further measures if northern Iraq's PUK party doesn't change its supportive attitude towards PKK terrorists,” Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said last week. “We will leave no space for separatist terrorist organisations to feel safe within and beyond our borders,” added Fidan, who was the country’s longest-serving intelligence chief.

“Türkiye can take different measures against the PUK – from isolating the group politically and economically to taking punitive acts by targeting the group’s growing ties with the PKK,” Abdullah Agar, a Turkish military analyst who served in Ankara’s cross-border operations in northern Iraq’s mountainous areas in the past as a special force officer, tells TRT World.

Ankara has already inflicted some economic pains on the PUK-run Sulaymaniyah, suspending civilian flights into the land-locked region, whose sole route to the West goes through Türkiye.

Turkish intelligence forces have also recently targeted several high-ranking PKK terrorists in the Sulaymaniyah region, sending strong messages to the PUK leadership.

Türkiye’s carrot-and-stick policy

In September, a drone strike targeted the Arbat airport in Sulaymaniyah, killing three members of PUK’s Counter-Terrorism Group (CTG) and injuring three others.

There were allegations that Türkiye was behind this attack. After the strike, Ankara issued a statement saying that PUK’s CTG was conducting a joint training exercise with YPG/PKK during the attack.

“The recent increase in PUK's open cooperation with the PKK naturally prompts Türkiye to take action,” says Bekir Aydogan, an Erbil-based political analyst.

Since Türkiye took a critical decision in 2019 to target terrorism at its source, Ankara’s cross-border operations have clearly intensified across northern Iraq, according to the analyst.

“Türkiye might target PUK elements if it sees a reason to believe that the PUK is cooperating with the PKK,” Aydogan tells TRT World.

Kirkuk’s provincial election results, which increased PUK’s seats in the oil-rich city, also contributed to tensions between Türkiye and the PUK, says Aydogan.

Early this month, Fidan said that Ankara was closely following political developments in Kirkuk, the ethnically diverse city composed of Arabs, Turkmens and Kurds.

As Turkish cross-border operations continue to intensify, Fidan also drew attention to his country’s consultation process with Iraqi authorities, saying that Ankara’s work is carried out meticulously to reinforce the Baghdad administration's evolving understanding of the PKK.

Ankara has also demanded that Baghdad recognise PKK as a terror group.

From this respect, Ibrahim Kalin, Fidan's successor, recently visited Iraq, meeting the country’s president and prime minister, respectively.

During the meetings, Kalin emphasised the common need to fight against terrorism, underlining Türkiye’s growing concerns in relation to PKK’s increasing presence in the Sulaymaniyah region.

Ankara has long had a working relationship with the KDP – from intelligence sharing to joint operations against the PKK – and Türkiye has aimed to form a similar relationship with the PUK, says Aydogan. But PUK’s historical ties with the PKK have prevented the group from forming an alliance with Türkiye, according to the analyst.

After Türkiye’s threat against Damascus in 1998, the Syrian government expelled PKK, including the terror group’s head Abdullah Ocalan, whom it had long provided refuge in the Middle Eastern country.

After Ocalan’s capture in 1999 by Turkish special forces, the PKK leadership moved from Syria to the Qandil mountains located in the Sulaymaniyah region with the help of the PUK, whose peshmergas used to control the mountains.

Growing PUK-PKK cooperation

There are too many irrefutable connections between the two groups, ranging from PUK’s crashed helicopters in Duhok in a March 2023 accident, which revealed that they were transporting PKK terrorists from Iraq to Syria, to the terror group’s frequent use of the Arpat airport in Sulaymaniyah, according to Agar.

The PUK, which has a military wing called Peshmerga forces like the KDP, has also allowed various PKK groups to run different areas from Garmian to Kele across the Sulaymaniyah region, Agar says.

“PUK's opening of space for the PKK in Sulaymaniyah caused the organisation to become more menacing. It has also become clear that PUK provides training to PKK/YPG elements in Syria. All of these developments reveal the dimensions of the relationship between PUK and PKK,” Fidan said.

There are also signs that the PUK, which controls the oil- and gas-rich areas in northern Iraq, shows indications of coordination with the PKK in terms of making the terror group become part of the region’s energy geopolitics just like the way the US has allowed the YPG to exploit northern Syria’s energy sources with its iron fist, according to Agar.

“PKK’s infection of northern Iraq’s energy sources appears to happen through areas such as the Khor Mor and Chemchemal energy corridor,” says Agar.

PUK’s collaboration with the PKK also aims to legitimise the terror group in the eyes of the international community in an illicit plan, showing that the terror group is able to work with a legitimate Iraqi political party, says Agar.

He draws attention to the fact that a similar legitimisation effort of the PKK has been put in play by the US in northern Syria by its alliance with the YPG while rejecting its clear ties with the PKK, the analyst adds.

Both PUK-PKK cooperation and the US-YPG alliance have long tested Türkiye’s patience, but brewing tensions can lead Ankara to further increase pressure over YPG presence in northern Syria and PUK-PKK ties in northern Iraq, says Agar.

Iranian factor

Unlike the KDP, which has strong ties with Türkiye, the PUK has strong connections with Iran, which neighbours the Sulaymaniyah region, impacting PKK-PUK ties, according to many observers of the region, says Aydogan.

Iran recently launched rocket strikes into Erbil, killing Pervez Dizayee, an Iraqi Kurdish businessman who is affiliated with the Barzani family and the KDP. The attack also killed the businessman's baby daughter as well as a guest who happened to be in his house at the time of Tehran’s strike.

But this attack is not a new thing for the KDP, which was targeted by Tehran in November 2022 when anti-Iranian protests raged across the Shia-majority country. “Iran never targets Sulaymaniyah but always attacks Erbil,” says Aydogan.

While the 2022 Iranian protests spread across the country, Tehran not only blamed Western states but also some armed Kurdish groups based in northern Iraq allegedly under the protection of the KDP, which is the leading political force in the KRG.

The protests in Iran were triggered by the death of Mahsa Amini, an Iranian Kurdish woman, during her custody in Tehran.

“Tensions between Iran and Barzani are not a new thing, but since anti-government protests across Iran’s different regions, things have become more tense between the Barzani leadership and Iran,” Mehmet Bulovali, an Istanbul-based Iraqi-Kurdish political analyst, who was head adviser to Tariq Hashimi, the former vice-president of Iraq, had said during a 2022 interview with TRT World.

All this problematic history between the KDP and Iran, as well as the alleged elusive relations between the PKK terror group and Tehran, might also play a role in growing PUK-PKK ties, according to Aydogan.