KIRKUK, Iraq - The Turkish army sent soldiers about 1.5 miles into northern Iraq in an overnight operation on Tuesday, Kurdish officials said. A Turkish official said the troops were still in Iraq by midmorning.

To the south in Kirkuk, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice made an unannounced visit to the city that Iraq's Kurds call their Jerusalem, an oil-rich territory claimed by many.

The troops crossed into an area near the border with Iran, about 75 miles north of the city of Irbil, said Jabar Yawar, a spokesman for Kurdistan's Peshmerga security forces.

About 300 Turkish troops crossed the border at 3 a.m., said Jamal Abdullah, a spokesman for the regional Kurdistan government. He said the region was a deserted mountainous frontier area.

A Turkish government official, speaking in Ankara on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to speak to the media, confirmed that around 300 Turkish soldiers penetrated into northern Iraq.

"They are still there," he said without elaborating.

The U.S. Embassy in Baghdad declined to comment on reports of the Turkish operation.

On Sunday, Turkey conducted airstrikes against rebels from the Kurdish Workers' Party, or PKK, in northern Iraq. As many as 50 fighter jets were involved in the attack, the biggest against the PKK in years.

The Iraqi parliament on Monday condemned the bombing, calling it an "outrageous" violation of Iraq's sovereignty. Turkey said Sunday's attack used U.S. intelligence and was carried out with tacit American approval.

The PKK has battled for autonomy for southeastern Turkey for more than two decades and uses strongholds in northern Iraq for cross-border strikes.

Washington is trying to balance support for two key allies: the Turkish government and the Iraqi Kurds. Despite their apparent support for a limited raid, the U.S. remains firmly opposed to any major Turkish military operation into northern Iraq — which could disrupt one of the calmest areas of Iraq and run the risk of destabilizing the entire region.

Meanwhile, Rice was meeting members of a civilian-military reconstruction unit based in Kirkuk and provincial politicians. She was to meet Iraq's central leadership later in Baghdad.

Sunni Arabs ended a yearlong political boycott earlier this month in Kirkuk — the hub of Iraq's northern oil fields — under a deal that sets aside government posts for Arabs. It was the biggest step yet toward unity before a referendum on the area's future.

Kirkuk is an especially coveted city for both the Shiite-dominated Iraqi government in Baghdad and the Kurdish one in Irbil. Kurds want to incorporate it into their self-rule area, but the idea has met stiff resistance from Arabs and a constitutionally required referendum on the issue was delayed to next year.

Much of Iraq's vast oil wealth lies under the ground in the region, as well as in the Shiite-controlled south. Kurds control of the area's oil resources and its cultural attachment to Kurdistan have been hotly contested.

Turkish army sends soldiers into Iraq

According to turkish media; turkish war planes bombed only PKK camps in Mountain Qandil

People will talk....Turkish Army will clean the PKK terrorists out.

We shall than see what can be done to improve the lives of our Kurdish citizens and to help North Iraqi Kurds...

This better be understood !

I think in total (small or large scale), there have been 27 incursions into northern Iraq in last 27 years, this will be 28th if it happens..

Some are too old to fight themselves, but try to stop fighting parties so that peace can prevail...

Some are too scared to fight themselves, but believe their distant cheers to one fighting party is an honorable stand.

Turkia can not live with terrorists on her own or on the neighbor's mountains. In fact there is no place for terrorists, anywhere on this planet. PKK will be finished, no matter how long it takes. That is certain. But killing all young Kurdish boys and girls misguided into taking up arms for terrorism, need not be the only solution.

I do blame the cowards, cheering young Kurdish terrorists to their deaths, always from a safe distance, either for their own political interests or simply out of idiocity.....

Pictures from the turkish airstrike on Iraq

Strange enough to see that, there is no heated up discussion on this thread for pages and pages!

people must be tired or bored to talk the same things over and over again

about terrorism, morality, violence and being 'politically correct':

Terror and Terrorism

not to forget:
1. totalitarianism
2. corporatism
3. populism
4. misanthropy
5. nausea
6.