MİT ‘neutralizes’ senior PKK member in Iraq

MİT ‘neutralizes’ senior PKK member in Iraq

ANKARA

The National Intelligence Organization (MİT) has neutralized a local leader of the PKK in an operation in Iraq’s Duhok governorate.

Eyvaz Beyaz, code-named Zerdeşt Karadeniz, was wanted by Interpol with a red notice and was in the gray category of the Defense Ministry’s wanted list.

The ministry ranks those included on the list in five color-coded categories from red (most wanted) to blue, green, orange and grey.

Beyaz was found to carry out an armed attack on a gendarmerie vehicle in the northern province of Sinop’s Gerze district in October 2010 and a police vehicle in the Boyabat district in April 2011. He was also involved in the bomb attack against the gendarmerie command in the nearby province of Trabzon’s Düzköy district in June 2012.

Upon a notification obtained by the MİT that he was planning to take action in the metropolitan cities of Türkiye, Beyaz was neutralized during an operation in Iraq’s Gara region.

Beyaz joined the rural staff of the organization in 1994 and returned to Iraq in 2015 from Türkiye, where he moved to in 2006. He then took a responsible role in the organization’s “special power structure.”

“Neutralized” is a term used by the Turkish military and officials to indicate terrorists were either killed, wounded, or captured.

In its more than 35-year terror campaign against Türkiye, the PKK, listed as a terrorist organization by Türkiye, the U.S. and the European Union, has been responsible for the deaths of at least 40,000 people, including women, children and infants.