Feb. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Turkey's army withdrew its troops from northern Iraq after its biggest military incursion into the country in 11 years.

Turkish units pulled out early today after more than a week of battles with the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, the army said in a statement on its Web site. The clashes with the PKK, which seeks autonomy for Turkey's 15 million ethnic Kurds, killed 237 militants and 24 Turkish soldiers, the military said.

``This operation proves that northern Iraq is not a safe place for terrorists,'' the military said. ``We will continue to track their activities in northern Iraq and will not allow the region to become a source of threat.''

Turkey sent as many as 10,000 soldiers into the Iraqi Kurdish enclave on Feb. 21 in an incursion that increased political tensions with the government in Baghdad and drew criticism from the United Nations and European Union. President George W. Bush yesterday called on Turkey to withdraw its troops quickly.

Turkey, with the second-largest army in the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, was hunting 4,000 PKK militants who withdrew into Iraq after their leader, Abdullah Ocalan, was captured and put on trial in 1999. Turkey has fought the PKK for two decades at the cost of almost 40,000 lives, most of them Kurdish.

Twelve PKK bases, six training camps and 290 shelters were destroyed in the operation, the Turkish military said.

The operation was a ``serious violation of Iraq's sovereignty,'' Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said in a telephone interview earlier today. Turkey says articles of the UN Charter allowed it to cross the border on self-defense grounds.

Turkey reserves the right to re-enter northern Iraq if PKK units on Iraqi territory threaten Turkey's security, Justice Minister Mehmet Ali Sahin said, according to CNN Turk television.

``One thing that remains clear is that the United States, and Turkey and Iraq all continue to view the PKK as a terrorist organization that needs to be dealt with,'' White House spokesman Gordon Johndroe told reporters today.

To contact the reporters on this story: Mark Bentley in Ankara at mbentley3@bloomberg.net; Camilla Hall in London at chall24@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: February 29, 2008 10:31 EST