Turkish jets launched a fresh wave of airstrikes in Northern Iraq after NATO backed the country in its war against militant uprisings.

Images of bombs hitting several positions of the outlawed Kurdistan Worker’s party (PKK) were released by the country's armed forces.

The air raid came after all members of the 28-nation military alliance gave Turkey its full backing.

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Target: Turkish jets launched a fresh wave of air strikes on several positions of the outlawed Kurdistan Worker's party

Images of bombs hitting several positions in northern Iraq were released by the Turkish armed forces

Turkish planes taking off from Incirlik Air Base, in Adana, southeastern Turkey, ahead of the fresh wave of attacks

Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said NATO supported Ankara in the face of 'terrible acts of terror' and instability along its southern border.

'The security of the alliance is indivisible,' ambassadors from all 28 nations later declared in a statement after the meeting, called to assess the threat posed by ISIS and Kurdish rebels.

However, while public statements stressed NATO unity, an official said members also used the closed-door meeting to call on Turkey not to use undue force and to continue peace efforts with representatives of the Kurdish minority.

Hours earlier, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan had said it was impossible to continue a peace process with Kurdish militants and urged parliament to strip politicians with links to them of immunity from prosecution.

His comments come days after the Turkish air force bombed camps in northern Iraq belonging to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), following a series of attacks on police officers and soldiers in Turkey blamed on the Kurdish militant group.

The PKK said the air strikes, launched virtually in parallel with strikes against Islamic State fighters in Syria, rendered the peace process meaningless but stopped short of formally pulling out.

'It is not possible for us to continue the peace process with those who threaten our national unity and brotherhood,' Erdogan told a news conference in Ankara before departing on an official visit to China.

Earlier, a huge explosion crippled a major gas pipeline in Turkey in an apparent revenge attack by Kurdish rebels hours before NATO was due to discuss Ankara's campaign against militant groups.

Turkey's energy minister Taner Yildiz said the blast in Agri province shut down the flow of gas and suggested the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) was to blame.

The pipeline, which carries around 10 billion cubic meters of Iranian gas to Turkey each year, came under attack by Kurdish militants in the 1990s and up until 2013 when a ceasefire was established.

Speaking after the latest attack, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said it was impossible to continue a peace process with Kurdish militants and that politicians with links to 'terrorist groups' should be stripped of their immunity from prosecution.

Support: NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg attends a NATO ambassadors meeting on Turkey at the NATO headquarters in Brussels, where the 28-nation alliance backed Turkey's war against terror

Inferno: A huge explosion rips through a major gas pipeline in Turkey in an attack blamed on Kurdish rebels hours before NATO was due to discuss Ankara's campaign against militant groups in the Middle East

The gas pipeline blast comes amid a spike in violence from militants on two fronts in recent weeks.

Ankara last week launched raids against Kurdish rebel bases in northern Iraq – at the same time that it began cracking down on ISIS in Syria – ending a fragile cease-fire with the Kurds.

Turkish security forces have also rounded up some 900 suspected ISIS members, Kurdish militant sympathisers and leftist militants in a wave of raids in recent days.

The US and Turkey have agreed to work together to drive ISIS from Syria by creating a 'safe zone' along the border in what some have interpreted as an inflammatory attempt at a land grab.

Erdogan also said it would pave the way for the return of 1.7 million Syrian refugees currently being sheltered in Turkey.

The potentially game-changing accord comes as ambassadors from all 28 NATO countries were due to meet on Tuesday in Brussels – at Turkey's request – to discuss Ankara's strategy against ISIS and Kurdish militants.

The plan opens the possibility of a safe haven for tens of thousands of displaced Syrians, but also sets up a potential conflict with U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish forces in the area.

The move further embroils Turkey, a key NATO ally, in Syria's civil war, and also catapults it into a front-line position in the global war against ISIS.

A senior Obama administration official said Monday that U.S. discussions with Turkey about an IS-free zone focused on a 68-mile stretch still under ISIS control.

Crippled: Turkey's energy minister Taner Yildiz said the blast in Agri province shut down the flow of gas and suggested the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) were to blame

The U.S. has been conducting airstrikes there, which will accelerate now that the U.S. can launch strikes from Turkish soil, the official said.

No agreement between Turkey and the U.S. has yet been finalised, said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity under regulations.

In Washington, State Department spokesman John Kirby said that any joint military efforts with Turkey would not include the imposition of a no-fly zone.

The U.S. has long rejected Turkish and other requests for a no-fly zone to halt Syrian government air raids, fearing it would draw U.S. forces further into the civil war.

While details of the buffer-zone plan have yet to be announced, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said Ankara and Washington have no intention of sending ground troops into Syria but wanted to see Syria's moderate opposition forces replace ISIS near the Turkish border.

'Moderate forces like the Free Syrian Army will be strengthened, a structure will be created so that they can take control of areas freed from ISIL, air cover will be provided.

'It would be impossible for them to take control of the area without it,' Davutoglu told Turkey's A Haber television. ISIL is an alternate acronym for the Islamic State group.

A police officer checks IDs as Turkish police raid homes in the Haci Bayram neighbourhood of the capital Ankara, detaining at least 15 people suspected of having links to the Islamic State

The discussions came amid a major tactical shift in Turkey's approach to ISIS.

After months of reluctance, Turkish warplanes started striking militant targets in Syria last week, and allowed the U.S. to launch its own strikes from Turkey's strategically located Incirlik Air Base.

Turkey has also called a meeting of its NATO allies for Tuesday to discuss threats to its security and its airstrikes.

Davutoglu said 'NATO has a duty to protect' Turkey's border with Syria and Iraq, and that Ankara will seek the alliance's support for its actions at the meeting in Brussels.

But a Turkish-driven military campaign to push IS out of territory along the Turkish border is likely to complicate matters on the ground.

U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters in Syria, who have been the most successful in the war against IS, control most of the 910 kilometers (565 miles) boundary with Turkey, and have warned Ankara against any military intervention in northern Syria.

The Islamic State controls roughly a 60-mile stretch of that border, wedged between Turkish-backed insurgents with Islamist ideologies to the left and Kurdish forces from the People's Protection Unit, known as the YPG, to the right.

Those detained in Ankara's Haci Bayram neighbourhood reportedly included a number of foreign nationals

The Turkish-U.S. plan raises the question of which Syrian rebel forces would be involved in a ground operation against ISIS.

The U.S. has long complained about having no reliable partners among them. Defense Secretary Ash Carter acknowledged earlier this month that the U.S. has only 60 trainees in a program to prepare and arm thousands of moderate Syrian rebels in the fight against ISIS militants.

The Obama administration official said the U.S.-led coalition was looking to anti-ISIS forces such as Syrian Kurds and the Free Syrian Army. He did not elaborate.

Syria's main Kurdish militia – the YPG or the People's Protection Units – is affiliated with the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, which has waged a decades-long insurgency in Turkey and maintains bases in remote parts of northern Iraq.

Nawaf Khalil, head of the Germany-based Kurdish Center for Studies, said Ankara is likely trying to limit advances by the Syrian Kurdish forces by using the war against ISIS as a pretext and to steer Washington away from the YPG, but 'this will not work.'

In a reflection of the complexities involved, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on Monday refused to draw a distinction between the Islamic State group and the PKK.

'There is no difference between PKK and Daesh,' Cavusoglu said, using the Arabic acronym for Islamic State group. The PKK is fighting the ISIS 'for power, not for peace, not for security,' he said.

Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said plans had been agreed with the United State to create a 'safe zone' free from ISIS along a 60-mile stretch of its border with Syria

Kirby, the State Department spokesman, said 'Turkey has a right to defend itself' against the PKK.

In a series of cross border strikes since Friday, Turkey has not only targeted the IS group but also Kurdish fighters affiliated with forces battling the extremists in Syria and Iraq.

Also, the YPG and an activist group said Turkish troops had shelled the Syrian border village of Til Findire, targeting Kurdish fighters and hitting one of their vehicles on Sunday night.

The village is east of the border town of Kobane, where the Kurds handed a major defeat to the Islamic State group earlier this year.

But Turkish officials dismissed the claims, insisting their forces were only targeting ISIS in Syria and the PKK in neighboring Iraq.

An Ankara official said Turkey returned fire after Turkish soldiers at the border were fired upon, in line with Turkey's rules of engagement.

'The Syrian Kurds are not a target of the operations. Our operations only target ISIS in Syria and PKK in Iraq,' he said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of rules that bar officials from speaking to journalists without authorization.

Late on Monday, a major in Turkey's military police died after suspected PKK militants fired on his car in the southeastern province of Mus, said the region's governor, Vedat Buyukersoy.

The major was among the highest ranking Turkish officers to be killed in attacks in recent years.

Turkish police raided homes in a neighbourhood in the capital earlier in the day, detaining at least 15 people suspected of links to the Islamic State group, the Turkish state-run news agency said.

The number of suspects detained in a major anti-terror operation launched on Friday has reached 1,050, according to the office of Turkey's prime minister.

However, in the absence of a no-fly zone to neutralize Syrian President Bashar Assad's warplanes, it is not clear how the possible buffer zone may be considered a safe haven where displaced people could return.

And despite the U.S. and Turkey's shared interests in fighting the Islamic State, the Turks have also prioritized defeating Assad.

While the U.S. says Assad has lost legitimacy, it has not taken direct military action to try to remove him from office and says he is not the target of its efforts in Syria.

Ege Seckin, a Turkey expert at IHS Country Risk, said ISIS is a national security threat for Turkey, but was nonetheless secondary.