BAGHDAD — Iraq has requested an emergency meeting of the United Nations Security Council to discuss the presence of Turkish troops on its territory as a dispute with Ankara escalates.
Turkey’s parliament voted last week to extend the deployment of an estimated 2,000 troops across northern Iraq by a year to combat “terrorist organizations” – a likely reference to Kurdish rebels as well as ISIS.
Iraq condemned the vote, and Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi warned Turkey risked triggering a regional war. On Wednesday, Ankara and Baghdad each summoned the other’s ambassador in protest at remarks from the other camp.
Turkey says its military is in Iraq at the invitation of Masoud Barzani, president of the Kurdish regional government, with which Ankara maintains solid ties. Baghdad says no such invitation was ever issued.
Most of the Turkish troops are at a base in Bashiqa, north of Mosul and close to Turkey’s border, where they are helping to train Iraqi Kurdish peshmerga and Sunni fighters.
Tensions between Baghdad and Ankara have risen with expectations of an offensive by U.S.-backed Iraqi forces to retake Mosul, the last major Iraqi city under ISIS control, captured by the militants two years ago.
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