Hurriyet: Turkish preparations for the war against Iraq
Iraq-Turkey, Politics, 12/20/2002

The Turkish daily Hurriyet said Wednesday quoting well-informed sources at the Turkish- Iraqi border area that some 10,000 to 15,000 Turkish troops were deployed on Wednesday along the borders with Iraq and most of them are landing forces. This was in the context of the preparatory works for any military operation against Iraq, the paper said.

The paper added that Turkey will increase the number of Turkish land forces of 65,000 to 70,000 troops in the North of Iraq in case Washington will deploy 60,000 troopers there, so as number of the Turkish forces will be greater and this is to prevent imposing any de facto condition during the military intervention in Iraq.

The paper added that Turkey has started preparations to discuss the American demands relating to the use of Turkish bases, airports, ports, railways and land routes in the war against Iraq, noting that deploying of 30,000 American soldiers to the south of Turkey and other 60,000 in northern Iraq come on the forefront of the American demands Washington waits to get from Turkey during the current week.

The paper also indicated that planes for providing fuel of KS 135 type which belong to the Turkish forces and stationed at the military air base in Ancerlik started to fuel the American planes which reach the Turkish airspace.

Previous Stories:
  Turkey denies Iraqi demands for Atropine   (11/14/2002)
  Iraq accuses Turkey of violating its airspace   (11/11/2002)
  Ardoghan: we will not take part in attacking Iraq   (11/8/2002)

Please add a link on your webiste pointing to ArabicNews.com and bookmark ArabicNews.com & subscribe to our daily email news bulletin.

Search