The Press Office of People’s Defense Forces (HPG) said in a written statement on Wednesday that the Turkish army continues committing crimes in southern Kurdistan (northern Iraq) where it has escalated its military activities in preparation for a large-scale invasion operation in the region.

The HPG statement said: “The occupying Turkish army commits war crimes and uses banned explosives and chemical weapons every day in Kurdistan. It resorts to all kinds of immoral and illegal methods in order to break the guerrilla resistance and realise its aim of occupying Southern Kurdistan. Although it claims that its main target is the guerrilla, it has been proven by thousands of inhumane attacks that it is hostile to all the values of the Kurdish people and the nature of Kurdistan. One of the latest crimes committed by the occupying Turkish army is the destruction of the centuries-old burial place of the people of Sêgirêya Jorîn village in Amediye district of Southern Kurdistan. The occupying Turkish army, with the support of the KDP, has been trying to turn the Sêgirêya Jorîn village cemetery into a base for itself by demolishing it in the last three days with the diggers it dispatched to the area through the Serzêrê border crossing and the asphalt roads of Amediyê city. The occupying Turkish army and state, with this practice, once again exceeded all kinds of moral, religious and social measures and insulted the values of our people by acting factiously."