Iraq's Kurds are ready for talks with Turkey but will not accept any Turkish military interference in Iraq, the prime minister of the Kurdish regional government said Saturday. Nechervan Barzani spoke after the Kurdish parliament held a meeting to discuss rising tensions with Turkey. The leader of the Kurdish autonomous region, Massoud Barzani, has suggested Iraqi Kurds would interfere in Turkey's predominantly Kurdish southeast if the country meddled in Iraq's affairs, according to AP. «We are ready to sit with them for a dialogue at any time and in any place,» said Nechervan Barzani, who is the nephew of the Kurdish president. «We don't accept any military interference inside Iraq's territory.» On Friday, Turkish troops killed four armed Kurdish guerrillas who had crossed over the border from northern Iraq, according to Turkey's government-owned Anatolia news agency. The guerrillas were killed in a gunbattle that broke out among troops and a group of about 15 rebels near the town of Semdinli on the Iraqi border, Anatolia said. The deaths bring to 17 the number of guerrillas killed this week in clashes in Turkey's southeast. Earlier in the week, the head of Turkey's armed forces requested permission to launch an operation into northern Iraq to attack the Kurdish rebels at their bases there. «Threats do not solve the problems. We are neighbors and should solve our problems through dialogue,» the prime minister said. Close to 40,000 people have died in fighting since autonomy-seeking rebels of the Kurdistan Workers Party, or PKK, took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984. -- SPA
