The Marxist-Leninist Communist Party Kurdistan (MLKP) Kurdistan released a statement vowing to resist the Turkish occupation campaign in southern Kurdistan (northern Iraq).

“The colonialist fascist Turkish bourgeois state, with the support of the KDP and the Iraqi government, is expanding its occupation attack on the territory of South Kurdistan. Our mountains are bombed, our villages are evacuated, our people are forcibly displaced. A genocidal attack is being carried out with chemical gases and tactical nuclear bombs,” said the statement on Thursday.

MLKP Kurdistan pointed out that the colonialist Turkish state's invasion attacks are based on the ‘centuries-old Ottoman dream’ and said: “The Turkish state is heading towards annexing the lands of South Kurdistan up to Mosul and Kirkuk. NATO states, which have recently convened and openly declared their intention to bring the world to the brink of the third world war, support the genocide policy and occupation of the Turkish state.”

MLKP Kurdistan stated that the Turkish state also carried ISIS gangs to South Kurdistan and that the KDP-Barzani family ‘deepened in the collaborator treacherous line’.

“The KDP has become desirous of becoming a colonial governor. If the Turkish state gains full sovereignty in South Kurdistan, they will not even have as much authority as the trustee appointed to Hakkari Municipality, let alone maintain their bourgeois power,” MLKP said.

Emphasising the resistance of the guerrillas against the occupation, MLKP Kurdistan celebrated the 19 July Rojava revolution on its twelfth anniversary and said: “Our freedom guerrillas will take strength from the strong popular actions in North Kurdistan, Rojava, Turkey and European metropolises against occupation and colonialism and will further increase their resistance.”

The statement concluded: “We call on all our people in Turkey, Iraq and Syria, especially our labouring peoples from Turkish and Arab sovereign nations, to raise the struggle against these genocidal, occupying and colonialist attacks. Unless colonised Kurdistan is free, no people will be free. We call on all progressive, revolutionary parties and organisations, democratic mass organisations and honourable intellectuals in the four parts of Kurdistan and the region to stand up against this war and occupation.”