Some of the injured were children and all of the casualties were Arab tourists, according to initial reports.
At least eight civilians were killed and dozens of others were wounded after rockets were fired allegedly by the Turkish military towards a number of tourist sites in the Duhok Governorate of the Kurdistan Region of Iraq on Wednesday, according to Kurdish and Iraqi media reports.
Video reportedly from the scene showed people running and screaming as explosions could be heard in the background. Additional footage showed injured people laying in the back of trucks, as well as large crowds outside local hospitals.
Scene of the attack
Some of the injured were children and all of the casualties were Arab tourists, according to the Kurdish news site Rudaw.
The mayor of Zakho, Muhsin Bashir, told Rudaw that a village in the district was bombed by Turkey twice, adding that Turkey was claiming that members of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) “were roaming the village, which led Turkey to bombard it.”
Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa Al-Kazemi sent the country’s foreign minister and security delegation to the site of the bombardment in order to investigate the incident and visit the wounded.
Turkey’s operations against the PKK
Turkey has been intensifying operations against the PKK and groups associated with it in northern Syria and Iraq in recent months.
The bombardment comes just a day after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, Russian President Vladimir Putin and Iranian Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei met in Iran, with Khamenei warning Erdoğan against a military operation in Syria.
A trilateral statement by the three leaders stated that there is “no room in our region’s future for separatist terror organizations” and committed to continue the “fight against terrorist organizations.” The Turkish president stated that he expected Russia and Iran to support Turkey’s operations in Syria.