Turkey Rejects Baghdad’s Demand To Withdraw Troops From Northern Iraq

Cavusoglu said Ankara sent military forces near the city Mosul on December 3 to protect and replace Turkish soldiers already deployed there.

However, on Sunday Davutoglu was reduced to saying that Turkey would cease further troop transfers to Bashiqa out of respect for Iraq’s sovereignty.

The apparent aiming of a shoulder-held missile-launcher at Istanbul by a Russian sailor while passing through the Bosphorus is little more than a “childish show”, Turkey’s Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmuş said Monday.

The Turkish troops intend to train Kurdish Peshmerga forces there.

The prime minister said he therefore asked the Turkish government to be a good neighbor and refrain from interfering in Iraq’s internal affairs.

Mosul, Iraq’s second largest city with a civilian population of one million, was overrun by the Islamic State in June 2014.

“No matter the size of the force entering Iraq, it is rejected”, the statement said.

“This is a part of that training”, one senior Turkish official said. The compound near Mosul is in the area claimed by both the Iraqi Kurds and the central government in Baghdad.

A much-anticipated counter-offensive by Iraqi forces to retake Mosul from ISIL has been repeatedly postponed because they are tied down in fighting elsewhere.

The founder of the camp, former Ninevah governor Atheel al Nujaifi, said the Turkish trainers were called in by Iraq’s Prime Minister and defence minister.

According to press secretary, Iraq’s People’s Mobilization will take appropriate measures against Turkish forces if Ankara does not pull its troops out of the country.

“This camp was established as a training camp for a force of local volunteers fighting terrorism”, he said in a televised speech.

However, the US military officials said that several hundred Turkish troops had moved into Iraq and appeared to be there for a training mission. Powerful Iraqi Shi’ite Muslim armed groups have pledged to fight any deployment of US forces to the country.

Abadi reiterated that foreign ground combat troops were not needed in Iraq.