Turkey sent military reinforcements into northern Iraq yesterday as clashes with militants from the Kurdistan Workers’ party (PKK) continued for a fourth day. According to the Turkish army, another 25 tanks crossed the border to help the hunt for PKK fighters, whom Turkey accuses of launching attacks on its forces from bases in the sparsely populated mountains along the Turkish-Iraqi border.
“The bombings are continuing by land and by air; the clashes are becoming heavier,” a Turkish military source told the Reuters news agency.
Roj TV, the voice of the PKK, reported that 5,000 Turkish troops with 60 tanks had launched an offensive against the militants early yesterday in the Matin mountains. Ahmed Deniz, a PKK spokesman, told the Guardian that fierce fighting was continuing in several places along the border.
– The Guardian
The security service, MI5, has drawn up plans to decamp to a state-of-the-art emergency headquarters in Northern Ireland if its base in London falls victim to a terrorist attack. The GB pound 20m building on the shores of Belfast Lough can house up to 400 staff and has a reserve computer system capable of co-ordinating all security operations.
– The Guardian
A fresh row erupted over the use of British air bases by US authorities as it emerged a plane used by the CIA has landed at an RAF airstrip in the past week.
A Gulfstream IV jet, identified by Amnesty International as a plane linked to the US intelligence agency, landed at RAF Northolt in west London.
The jet, registration N134BR, which flew from Morristown, New Jersey, to Britain, landed on Wednesday and returned on Friday. It was also seen at Luton airport in January.
– The Telegraph
