ANKARA, Turkey (AP) - Turkey's top general argued against targeting Iraq in the U.S.-led war on terrorism, saying Tuesday that it could lead to an undesired Kurdish state on Turkey's borders.
Turkey supports the current war on terrorism and served as the launching pad for attacks against Iraq during the 1991 Gulf Warand host U.S. and British warplanes enforcing a no-fly zone above northern Iraq since then.
Although Turkey's parliament on Tuesday extended that mission's mandate for six months as it did for years, Washington would still need Turkey's consent to use Turkish bases to stage possible attacks on Iraq.
``Is there any new mistake committed by Iraq? Or accounts of 10 years ago are being settled?,'' Gen. Huseyin Kivrikoglu, chief of the general staff, told reporters Tuesday evening. His comments reflected skepticism about Iraq emerging as a possible target.
Advocates of attacking Iraq argue that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein is trying to restart programs to build weapons of mass destruction, which U.N. inspectors tried to dismantle after the 1991 Gulf War. Inspectors have not been allowed into Iraq since departing ahead of U.S. airstrikes in late 1998.
Kivrikoglu indicated that if Saddam is ousted, Iraqi Kurds would take advantage of a power vacuum to set up a Kurdish state which may boost aspirations of autonomy-seeking Kurds inside Turkey.
``Nobody would like this country (Iraq) to fall apart and the emergence of new ethnic states,'' said Kivrikoglu.