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Turkey will seek closer cooperation with the Kurdish leaders of semi-autonomous Kurdistan region in 'northern Iraq' to curb Turkish Kurd PKK rebels taking refuge in their region, Foreign Minister Ali Babacan said Monday.
Babacan's remarks signaled a softening of the Turkish stance towards Iraqi Kurds. Ankara has accused them in past of harbouring militants of the Turkey's separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
"We have had some differences... over the PKK. But in the coming days, you can expect increasing contacts on various levels with the administration of northern Iraq," the Anatolia news agency quoted Babacan as saying.
Closer dialogue with the Iraqi Kurds "is important with respect to fighting the (PKK) and also for our economic relations and energy cooperation with Iraq as a whole," the minister said.
Ankara has accused the Iraqi Kurds, who run autonomous Kurdistan in northern Iraq, of tolerating the PKK and even supplying it with weapons and explosives. Kurdish authorities in Kurdistan region strongly reject the claim.
Iraqi Kurdistan politician says, Turkey is using Turkey's Kurdish separatist PKK rebel group as an excuse to invade Kurdistan region 'Iraq' to prevent the establishment of Kurdistan state in the Kurdish autonomous region in 'northern Iraq', Turkey fears this could fan separatism among its own large Kurdish population in southeast Turkey.
Tensions eased a week after the cross-border operation when Iraqi President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, visited Ankara and pledged cooperation against the PKK.
But Turkey's ties with the administration of northern Iraq, led by Massoud Barzani, the president of Kurdistan region, remain chilly and the United States has often called on both sides to mend fences.
Over 39,000 Turkish soldiers and Kurdish PKK guerrillas have been killed since 1984 when the PKK took up arms for self-rule in the country's mainly Kurdish southeast of Turkey. A large Turkey's Kurdish community openly sympathise with the Kurdish PKK rebels.
The PKK demanded Turkey's recognition of the Kurds' identity in its constitution and of their language as a native language along with Turkish in the country's Kurdish areas, the party also demanded an end to ethnic discrimination in Turkish laws and constitution against Kurds, ranting them full political freedoms.