Special to WorldTribune.com

Baghdad has said Turkish forces are illegally deployed in Iraq and demanded their immediate removal.

“We have confirmation that Turkish forces, numbering about one armored regiment with a number of tanks and artillery, entered Iraqi territory… allegedly to train Iraqi groups, without a request or authorization from Iraqi federal authorities,” a Dec. 5 statement from Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi’s office said.

The deployment “is considered a serious violation of Iraqi sovereignty,” the statement said.

Observers say Abadi has in the last few weeks taken an increasingly hard line on the presence of foreign forces in Iraq.

Maj. Gen. Nureddin Herki, a commander with the Kurdish Peshmerga in Iraq, said the Turkish troops were part of a routine rotation in a training program for troops fighting Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL).

“Another team arrived to the camp to replace the previous team, and the mission of the [new] force that came was only to protect the trainers and return the previous team to Turkey,” Herki said.

Herki rejected reports that Turkish forces were deployed to assist in an operation to recapture the nearby city of Mosul from ISIL.

  Haider al-Abadi, Iraq demands Turkey ‘immediately’ withdraw troops, Maj. Gen. Nureddin Herki, WorldTribune.com