"No one said 'withdraw'," General Yasar Buyukanit said in an interview with the popular Milliyet daily.

"This was a decision taken on military reasons altogether. There was not even a hint from politicians or foreigners to withdraw."

The general staff announced Friday it had ended a week-long ground offensive against separatist Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) rebels in the autonomous north of Iraq, pulling its forces out in the early hours of the day.

The withdrawal came a day after US President George W. Bush urged Turkey to end its withdrawal "as quickly as possible" and visiting US Defence Secretary Robert Gates personally put pressure on Turkish leaders during talks in Ankara.

Buyukanit said the decision to pull out was given long before Gates arrived in Ankara after Turkish troops killed 240 out of the 300 PKK rebels targeted near a major base before losing contact with the militants.

It had not been announced earlier for tactical reasons, he said.

"One third of our forces were inside Turkey on Wednesday, but it would have been murder to announce the withdrawal then," the general said.

"The most critical phase of an operation is withdrawal...When you say your forces are withdrawing, it amounts to telling terrorists to set up an ambush. That would be an enormous mistake," he added.

"That is why the criticism is really unfair," he said.

Claims of an abrupt withdrawal were strengthened after a first text of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan's monthly television address, said the operation was being pursued" even after Baghdad had confirmed that troops were leaving its territory.

That version of the speech was distributed Friday afternoon with an embargo until the evening. A few hours later, his office distributed a second text of the speech that mentioned the pull-out.

Buyukanit defended Erdogan, saying that the prime minister knew about the withdrawal, but rightly did not mention it in the text of the address for the safety of the operation.

"He could not have said they are withdrawing or will withdraw. It is not possible," the general said.

The PKK, listed as a terrorist group by Ankara and much of the international community, has waged an armed separatist campaign in Kurdish-majority southeast Turkey since 1984.

Ankara charges that an estimated 4,000 PKk rebels have found refuge in Iraq.