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Turkish tanks roll into Syria to fight Kurdish militia
HASSA, Turkey, Jan 22, 2018 (BSS/AFP) – Turkish troops and tanks entered
Syria on Sunday to push an offensive against Kurdish militia as rockets hit
border towns in apparent retaliation and the United States urged Ankara to
show restraint.
Turkey on Saturday launched operation “Olive Branch” seeking to oust from
the Afrin region of northern Syria the Peoples’ Protection Units (YPG) which
Ankara considers a terror group.
But the campaign risks further increasing tensions with Turkey’s NATO ally
Washington, which has supported the YPG in the fight against Islamic State
(IS) jihadists and warned Ankara about distracting the focus from that fight.
In its first reaction to the offensive, the US State Department urged
Turkey Sunday “to exercise restraint and ensure that its military operations
remain limited in scope and duration and scrupulous to avoid civilian
casualties”.
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said Ankara had given Washington advanced
warning of their operation, adding Turkey’s security concerns were
“legitimate”.
Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said troops crossed into YPG-
controlled region in Syria at 0805 GMT, the Dogan news agency reported.
Thirty-two Turkish planes destroyed a total of 45 targets including
ammunition dumps and refuges used by the YPG on the second day of the
operation, the Turkish army said.
Turkish troops were advancing alongside forces from the Ankara-backed rebel
Free Syrian Army (FSA) and were already five kilometres (three miles) inside
Syria, state media said.
An AFP photographer saw more Turkish tanks lined up at the border waiting
to cross into Syrian territory.
Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said in televised comments several
villages had already been taken in the advance.
But a YPG spokesman claimed Turkish forces seeking to enter Afrin had been
“blocked” and that it had hit two Turkish tanks.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said a total of 18
civilians had been killed so far in the two-day operation, including eight
members of the same family sheltering in a building that was flattened by an
airstrike.
The YPG confirmed the deaths, sending out pictures of Kurdish Red Crescent
rescuers retrieving bloodied bodies from a collapsed concrete structure.
But Ankara denied any civilian casualties, with Cavusoglu accusing the YPG
of sending out “nonsense propaganda and baseless lies”.
– ‘A very short time’ –
In his first comments on the offensive since it began, President Recep
Tayyip Erdogan expressed hope the “operation will be finished in a very short
time” and vowed “we will not take a step back”.
Following calls from some Turkish pro-Kurdish politicians for people to
take to the streets, he warned that anyone protesting in Turkey against the
operation would pay “a heavy price”.
MORE/MSY/0829 hrs
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Police stopped demonstrations against the campaign taking place in the
mainly Kurdish southeastern city of Diyarbakir and in Istanbul, making
arrests, AFP correspondents said.
In a sign of the risks to Turkey, six rockets fired from Syria hit the
Turkish border town of Reyhanli Sunday, killing one Syrian refugee and
wounding 32 people, its mayor said.
Earlier, several rockets hit the Turkish border town of Kilis without
causing fatalities.
The operation is Turkey’s second major incursion into Syria during the
seven-year civil war after the August 2016-March 2017 Euphrates Shield
campaign in an area to the east of Afrin, against both the YPG and IS.
Turkey accuses the YPG of being the Syrian offshoot of the Kurdistan
Workers’ Party (PKK) which has waged a rebellion in Turkey for more than
three decades and is regarded as a terror group by Ankara and the EU and US.
Afrin is an enclave of YPG control, cut off from the longer strip of
northern Syria that the group controls to the east, extending to the Iraqi
border which has a US military presence.
Turkish Deputy Prime Minister Bekir Bozdag ruled out the risk of a clash
with American forces, saying they were not present in the Afrin region.
Yildirim was quoted as saying that the Turkish forces aimed to create a
security zone some 30 kilometres (18 miles) deep inside Syria.
– ‘Brutal degradation’ –
The new Turkish incursion has alarmed many countries, with the UN Security
Council expected to discuss the worsening humanitarian crisis in Syria later
Monday at France’s request.
French Defence Minister Florence Parly said the fighting “must stop” as it
could deter YPG fighters helping the international coalition against IS.
Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian said France was calling the UN Security
Council meeting as it was deeply worried by the “brutal degradation of the
situation” in flashpoints like Afrin.
Crucial is the attitude of Russia, which has a military presence in the
area and is also working with Turkey on a drive to end the civil war.
The Russian foreign ministry voiced concern and urged Turkey to show
restraint, while the defence ministry said its troops were withdrawing from
the Afrin area to ensure their security and prevent any “provocation”.
The Turkish foreign ministry said it had informed the Syrian regime —
through its Istanbul consulate — of the operation despite being at odds with
Damascus throughout the civil war.
But the Syrian foreign ministry strongly denied this and President Bashar
al-Assad slammed the offensive as “support for terrorism”.
BSS/AFP/MSY/0829 hrs