ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday that a flight ban on Sulaimani International Airport will continue as long as the local administration refuses to distance itself from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
“I said during my visit to Erbil that unless the Sulaimani administration distances itself from the PKK, there will be no change in our attitude towards Sulaimani. The embargo on the airspace will continue,” Erdogan told reporters on his way from a NATO summit in Washington.
He said that Ankara has repeatedly informed the Sulaimani administration, led by the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), that it would reevaluate the ban if the PUK took “some steps” against the PKK.
“The ball is in their court now,” he concluded.
Turkey in June extended the flight ban for six months, marking the third extension of the ban that bars flights in and out of Sulaimani from using Turkey’s airspace.
When first imposing the ban last year, the Turkish foreign ministry spokesperson said it was in response to an alleged “intensification” of PKK activity in Sulaimani province, referring to the crash of two helicopters carrying Syrian Kurdish fighters a month earlier.
Nine members of the anti-terrorism forces of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) were killed in the crash, including their commander, according to the SDF. The helicopters were bound for Sulaimani. Ankara alleges the Syria forces are affiliated with the PKK.
Turkish officials have repeatedly accused Sulaimani authorities of supporting the PKK and the flight ban is not the first time Ankara has taken punitive measures against the province.
Turkey also frequently carries out air and drone strikes on PKK targets in the province.
Speaking at a regional forum in Erbil in October last year, PUK leader Bafel Talabani said that his party’s problems with Turkey are “hard to resolve.”
