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Erdogan vows to clear Syria of a US-backed Kurdish militia

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ISTANBUL: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday promised to clear Syria of a US-backed Kurdish militia and militants after the US decision to pull troops out.
“In the next months we will see an operational style aimed at removing the YPG (Kurdish People’s Protection Units militia) and Daesh elements on the ground in Syria,” Erdogan said in Istanbul.
He promised last week to start a Turkish-led operation before US President Donald Trump on Wednesday ordered 2,000 American ground forces to leave Syria.
Erdogan welcomed Trump’s decision but said he remained “cautious” because of “past negative experiences,” referring to Ankara’s continued disappointment over the US administration’s failure to stop providing military support to the YPG against Daesh.
In November last year, Turkish officials said Trump had promised not to supply weapons to the YPG militia, although the White House was not as explicit about its intentions.
American support to the YPG militia which spearheaded Washington’s battles in Syria to eliminate militants has long been a source of tension between the NATO allies.
Turkey says the YPG is a “terrorist offshoot” of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been waging an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984.
The PKK is blacklisted as a terror group by Turkey, the US and the European Union.

Erdogan said on Dec.12 that Turkey would start an offensive in northern Syria in “the next few days” but on Dec. 14, he spoke to Trump on the phone.
According to Turkish daily Hurriyet on Friday, Trump decided to pull out of Syria during that call with Erdogan and ordered his national security adviser John Bolton to “start the work” to prepare withdrawing troops.
The Turkish head of state on Friday said the US decision meant Turkey would “wait a little longer” before launching an operation which would involve Syrian rebels.
“Of course this is not an open-ended waiting period,” he warned, adding that Turkey was working on plans to “neutralize Daesh elements” that still exist in Syria.
“Mr Trump told us during our conversation ‘will you clean Daesh from here?’ We have cleared them and after this, we will clear them. As long as you give us the support in terms of logistics. And have they (the US) started to withdraw? They have,” he added.

How United States pull the rug underneath of the Kurds (YPG) in Afrin let Erdogan Have it.

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Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) handed over the city center without engaging in urban warfare against the Turkey-led Free Syrian Army (FSA) forces Because the United States pull the rug underneath of the Kurds.

Report “Evidence the YPG had initially planned to stay and fight in the city includes vast stores of weapons supplied by Russia and the United States that were found by Turkish forces, reported Hurriyet citing intelligence sources. But the fighters abandoned Afrin, hiding in civilian convoys headed for Tell Rifaat and Aleppo beginning March 14 after US commanders, recognizing Turkey’s determination and capacity to take the area, persuaded the YPG to return to the Kurdish-controlled city of Manbij and resume the fight against IS [the Islamic State],

Erdogan Allies Lobbied U.S. Congress Against Kurds

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Erdogan Allies Lobbied Congress Against Kurds

Erdogan Allies Lobbied Congress Against Kurds

by John Rossomando

Leaders of Turkish-American groups closely tied to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan lobbiedCongress last week to end U.S. support for the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), which forms the backbone of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) coalition that the U.S. supports against ISIS.

The groups included Turkish American National Steering Committee (TASC), Cihannuma US, and MUSIAD USA, which the Turkish news site Haberler.com describes as the American branch of Erdogan’s Islamist AKP Party’s MUSIAD business network.

In a September 2016 speech to the group, Erdogan promised to help TASC, which he called an effective mechanism for uniting Turkish-American groups that lets them campaign on issues of common interest.

Last week’s lobbying effort took place although none of the organizations registered with the Justice Department as agents of a foreign government under the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA). All who lobby on behalf of foreign governments or political parties are required to register under the act. It was organized by Murat Guzel, a Pennsylvania businessman who sits on the boards of MUSIAD USA and TASC, the Turkish news site Haberler.com reported.

Guzel complained about $550 million in SDF support that the Pentagon has requested from Congress at a Capitol Hill news conference covered by Turkish media outlets and by Voice of America.

“This money is being paid for with our taxes, and it is ironic that US intelligence organizations also describe this group as an extension of the PKK as a terrorist organization,” Guzel said. “We have received very positive results especially from the talks that we had yesterday and today and we will increase our visits.”

Turkey invaded Syria’s predominately Kurdish Afrin region in January seeking to punish the YPG, which the Erdogan government views as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). The PKK has waged a violent campaign for Kurdish autonomy in Turkey during the past 40 years and is designated as a terrorist organization by the State Department.

Turkish leaders including Erdogan have become increasingly militant in their rhetoric since the Afrin military campaign began, with some calling their invasion a “jihad.” Even as its American branch lobbied Congress, Cihannuma’s top leader in Turkey, Mustafa Sen, claimed that Turkey is at war with the United States in Syria,

Asserting they are part of a multi-ethnic group dedicated to fighting ISIS, Syrian Democratic Front officials distanced themselves from the PKK in January. State Department officials responded to Turkish complaints about the SDF that month, saying it “serves the cause of regional stability.” The SDF redeployed 1,700 fighters in the past week who had been fighting ISIS to resisting the Turkish army and its jihadist allies in the Free Syrian Army around Afrin.

MUSAID USA President Mustafa Tuncer also criticized U.S. support for the SDF at the news conference, saying the SDF is made up of terrorists.

Last week’s lobbying effort used talking points similar to those offered by Turkish officials in their dealings with the Trump administration since the invasion of Afrin.

“Washington is crawling with Turkish organizations whose true purpose seems to be to engage in lobbying on behalf of Erdogan’s positions or obsessions of the day,” American Enterprise Institute Turkey expert Michael Rubin told the Investigative Project on Terrorism (IPT). “There’s two reasons for this: Turks figure that if they violate the law, they can just go home. But even if they get caught, the price is worth it because getting in President Erdogan’s good graces can be very lucrative indeed.

“It’s not just MUSIAD USA: There’s at least a half dozen organizations and maybe twice that who have gone down the same rabbit hole.”

Influence operations by MUSAID USA and TASC have gone on for the past few years.

Guzel and Tuncer wound up on the FBI’s radar in 2016 on suspicion they were spying for Turkey, according to a leaked Sept. 8, 2016 email from MUSIAD USA Executive Director Ibrahim Uyar to Erdogan’s son-in-law Berat Albayrak. It also noted that two FBI agents questioned Uyar, Guzel, Tuncer and two other men about MUSIAD and TASC.

Albayrak, who is Turkey’s energy minister, is widely considered to be Erdogan’s heir apparent. Media reports suggest that Albayrak personally profited from sales of ISIS oil.

“[The FBI agents] asked about MUSIAD and TASC. They are accusing me of trying to intervene in American politics on behalf of our President and making secret agents in the name of the Republic of Turkey. They have studied our work in the last two years and they have questions because of the report they received,” Uyar wrote.

Other emails released by WikiLeaks disclose that Guzel had frequent communications with Albayrak about his work.

The leaked documents show that these groups likely are funded through a secret discretionary budget used by Erdogan and his prime minister, said exiled Turkish journalist Abdullah Bozkurt, who said he reviewed them in-depth. Businesspeople who finance these operations in return receive favorable government contracts in Turkey, Bozkurt said.

TASC and MUSIAD USA have courted U.S. Islamist groups, including the Council of American Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the United States Council of Muslim Organizations (USCMO).

In his email to Albayrak, Uyar said he organized a TASC-sponsored demonstration outside the White House following the failed July 2016 Turkish coup attempt. CAIR Executive Director Nihad Awad and USCMO Secretary General Oussama Jammal spoke at the protest.

“I am sending this earmarked to you to keep you informed. Your Ambassador is working to solve the problem. It will be better for us. Inshallah … We will be able to give thanks to you. I will continue to fight for our cause in our country,” Uyar wrote.

This wasn’t the first time that TASC’s activities allegedly had a link with Turkish intelligence operations in the U.S.

TASC organized an April 2015 demonstration in conjunction with U.S. Islamist groups to downplay the 1915 Armenian genocide that killed 1.5 million people. Turkish intelligence agents attended an earlier meeting where the demonstration was planned, Egypt’s Al-Bawaba newspaper reported. Leaders of the pro-Muslim Brotherhood Egyptian Americans for Freedom and Justice (EAFJ) and an assistant to the Turkish Ambassador Serdar Kilic also attended, according to a Facebook post by EAFJ leader Mahmoud ElSharkawy. Al-Bawaba also described ElSharkawy as a member of the international Muslim Brotherhood. EAFJ itself has strong ties with the Egyptian Muslim Brotherhood.

ElSharkawy and EAFJ President Hani Elkadi, another attendee at the 2015 demonstration’s planning meeting, became contacts for the march. They promoted a website called FactCheckArmenia.com on their Facebook pages. The Poynter Institutefound that meeting attendee Ayhan Özmekik ran FactCheckArmenia.com. It also found that Özmekik had connections to Erdogan’s son, Bilal. Özmekik’s Facebook post about the planning meeting also noted that the organizers discussed how to get Egyptian Islamists in America to coordinate with the Turkish ambassador’s assistant.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu promoted the FactCheckArmenia.com site. Özmekik’s Facebook page additionally shows that he met with Çavuşoğlu days before the April 2015 TASC-organized demonstration.

Due to the revelations in the leaked documents, it would be “judicial malpractice” for the Justice Department to not investigate these groups to determine if they acted as agents of a foreign power, Rubin told the IPT.

“There’s also the danger of not doing so: If Turkey gets away with this, not only might the agents of Turkey become emboldened in the way they have in Europe, where they have been caught red-handed engaging in espionage and perhaps even in attacking dissidents, but it sends the signal to other countries that they can skirt US laws with abandon,” Rubin said.

Source: https://www.investigativeproject.org/7365/erdogan-allies-lobbied-congress-against-kurds#.WqK6IH1pavc.twitter

Turkey: The pro-Kurdish HDP party has elected Pervin Buldan, a Kurd, and Sezai Temelli, a Turk,

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(L-R) New co-chairmen of pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) Pervin Buldan (L) and Sezai Temelli (R) applaud outgoing co-chairwoman Serpil Kemalbay during the HDP Congress in Ankara on February 11, 2018. Photo:AFP/Adem Altan

HDP elects new co-chairs ahead of key votes in 2019

The pro-Kurdish HDP party has elected Pervin Buldan, a Kurd, and Sezai Temelli, a Turk, as new co-chairs of the party on Sunday.
More than 30,000 people took part in the one-day third party congress in the Turkish capital of Ankara.

2018 will be the year of HDP’s contributions to peace’: Temelli

Pervin Buldan and Sezai Temelli are the nominees for the co-chair positions. They were selected by consensus by a commission in advance of the congress.

Pervin Buldan, 50, a Kurd born in Hakkari province. Her husband, Savas Buldan was accused of being financing the PKK. He was abducted and killed in 1994.

She founded an association for the families of missing persons and is a member of the Saturday Mothers – group that commemorates victims of extrajudicial killings every Saturday. She entered politics in 2007 and is currently a HDP deputy for Istanbul and deputy speaker of the parliament.

“It is a source of honor for me to be given the position of Selahattin Demirtas who never compromised democratic and principled politics,” she told the congress.

She also thanked former co-chair Figen Yuksekdag, as a source of inspiration. “In the name of my party and myself, I thank beloved Yuksekdag for being on front in all conditions with her determination and inspiring us as women,” she said.

Buldan vowed that HDP will not succumb to the pressures being exerted on the party. “HDP did not kneel despite all the pressure, and it will not kneel. Let this be a lesson,” she asserted.

Sezai Temelli, 55, a Turk, is a founding member of HDP. He was elected to represent an Istanbul district in the June 2015, but lost his seat in the November 2015 election. He has served as the party’s vice chairman responsible for economic policy.

“2018 will be the year of HDP’s contributions to peace,” he told the congress, vowing “HDP will give this tyrant government the most important lesson.”

He stressed that the party represents all the peoples of Turkey, saying “All of us – Kurds, Turks, Alevis, Sunnis, Romans, and Christians – will be organized and go into power with our radical understanding of democracy.”

“This is our goal,” he stated.

Turkey’s pro-Kurdish HDP party to select new leadership duo

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Selahattin Demirtas, the incarcerated co-leader of the left-wing pro-Kurdish People’s Democracy (HDP) party, will not stand for re-election. Now a successor must be found as the party seeks a fresh start.

Selahattin Demirtas’ exit from the political stage in January was a blow to critics of the Turkish government. The co-leader of the left-wing Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), is revered by many in the Turkish opposition as a principled democrat who refuses to be bowed by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). Many Kurds had expressed hope that the HDP under Demirtas could bring help bring an end to ongoing ethnic exclusion. However, Demirtas’ decidedly dissident stance was not tolerated for very long. In November 2016, he was arrested on terrorism charges and has remained behind bars ever since. Turkey’s state prosecutor is demanding a 142-year jail sentence for Demirtas.

Now that Demirtas has said he will not run for HDP leadership, speculation over his potential successor is rife. All will be revealed on February 11, when a new HDP leadership duo is elected at a party conference in Ankara. Organizers expect some 25,000 attendees. Numerous European left-wing parties, like Syriza from Greece, Podemos from Spain and Germany’s Left party have been invited to act as observers.

The HDP is a Kurdish umbrella organization that unites several different groups active in western Turkey, including socialist parties, feminists, anti-militarists, environmentalists and LGBTI activists. As a matter of principle, the HDP leadership duo comprises one candidate with Kurdish roots and another with a Turkish and socialist background.

The name of one candidate has been common knowledge for a while: Pervin Buldan, a prominent figure in the Kurdish political movement. In June 1994, her husband, Savas Buldan, a Kurdish businessman, was abducted by unidentified armed individuals, tortured and then murdered during Turkey’s “dirty war” against the Kurds during the 1990s.

HDP spokesperson and parliamentarian Ayhan Bilgen hopes the party conference will mark a fresh start. “Our party is five years old. And Turkey’s political landscape has changed,” Bilgen said. He does not want to party to change its basic principles. Instead, he thinks, the HDP should pursue them by employing new methods and reorganizing. “We can neither give up on our goal of democratizing Turkey, nor on fighting for the rights of Kurds,” Bilgen insisted. He said his party should wage a democratic fight against Erdogan’s state of emergency in order to counter the country’s polarization.

Kurds in Syria call on US support to rein in Turkish operations

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Kurdish forces in Syria have called on the United States to do more to stop Turkey’s assault on Afrin. The US is to allow 7,000 Syrian refugees to remain in the US for a further 18 months under protected status.

Syria’s Kurdish militias have grown frustrated with the United States and its stance over the assault by Turkish forces in Afrin, on mainly Kurdish areas of northwestern Syria near the Turkish border.

“How can they stand by and watch?” Aldar Khalil, a senior Kurdish politician, asked of the US-led coalition. “They should meet their obligations towards this force that participated with them (in the fight against terrorism). We consider their unclear and indecisive positions as a source of concern.”

Turkey began an offensive, dubbed Operation Olive Branch, on January 20 with the stated aim of hitting positions held by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) and “Islamic State” militants, although IS is not known to have a presence in Afrin. Turkey, a NATO ally of the United States, views the main Kurdish militia as an extension of the Kurdish insurgency it has battled for decades.

The offensive has so far killed more than 60 civilians and dozens of fighters on both sides. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said the operation will be expanded to other areas, including Manbij, where American forces are stationed with Kurdish militia.

Avoiding conflict with Turkey

General Joseph Votel of US Central Command said Wednesday the US was doing “everything we absolutely can” to avoid a confrontation with Turkey in Syria. US officials also noted that President Donald Trump has spoken about the conflict directly with Erdogan and that the US government is publicly urging Turkey to limit its operation.

Kurdish officials say they do not expect the United States to go to war with Turkey or send troops to Afrin.

SOHR: ‘Turkey supports anything that harms the Kurds’

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As Turkey’s invasion against Kurds in the Afrin region continues, DW spoke with Rami Abdel Rahman, who runs the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. He sees a multifaceted conflict filled with murky alliances.

DW: Turkey’s military offensive against the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) in Syria has been going on for about a week. What are the developments?

Rami Abdel Rahman: The Turkish military is attacking along 10 corridors north and west of Afrin. Turkey and the Free Syrian Army (FSA), which supports it, are making slow progress because of fierce Kurdish resistance. Over the course of six days, they only conquered two villages and parts of five others. That is not much considering the number and intensity of Turkish airstrikes and Turkey’s statements at the onset of the campaign. In reality, Turkish troops have barely advanced into the Kurdish-controlled enclave of Afrin in northern Syria. In contrast to reports from both warring parties, our sources have confirmed a total of 133 fatalities so far: 47 Kurdish fighters, 51 FSA militants, four Turkish soldiers, 31 civilians killed by Turkish fire and two by Kurdish forces.

The Kurds have declared that they are pulling fighters from the Syrian cities of Raqqa and Deir el-Zour to reinforce their troops. But how is this possible considering that Afrin is a Kurdish enclave that’s separated from other Kurdish-controlled areas?

The only route available leads through territory controlled by the Syrian regime, via two towns north of Aleppo, to be exact. There have been reports claiming Damascus is allowing Kurds to pass its road barricades, provided they are unarmed and traveling as civilians. But my contacts in the area have not noticed an increase in men traveling through the region.

How credible are the YPG’s claims that they are sending dozens of foreign YPG fighters into the battle?

These foreigners predominantly joined to fight the Islamic State (IS). According to what we know, there are no foreign YPG fighters in Afrin. And, even if there were foreigners, they would not change the battle. They only have symbolic value and help generate favorable public opinion across the world for the YPG.

And who is fighting on the Turkish side?

Mainly Arabic and Turkmen FSA fighters from Aleppo, Idlib and Deir el-Zour. There are claims that the Nusra Front has joined the campaign against the YPG. But that’s not true. According to our information, claims that Chechen forces have joined the Turkish side are also false. So far, only Syrians are fighting alongside the Turkish army.

The objective of the FSA was always to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Why are they are pulling their forces from the embattled Idlib region to join the fight against the Kurds?

That’s because none of the groups is actually fighting for Syria! They are all pursuing some foreign agenda. In this case, they’re following Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s agenda. They have neither fought against IS, nor against the Syrian regime in Deir el-Zour. But now they’ve suddenly joined Turkey’s military operation against the Kurds. Some FSA fighters were forced out of Homs by Syrian troops but are now fighting in Afrin. Last week, Damascus regained control over 320 villages in Idlib province. All fighters affected by this have also moved to Afrin. It’s true that many opposition groups want to exact revenge on the YPG for attacking the local Arab population. We have reported on these attacks. But they were not as severe as Turkish and Qatari media reports made them out to be.

Some observers claim that the Kurds are ready to cede Afrin to Assad to prevent it from falling under Turkish control. How credible is this?

In reality, that’s what the Russians are demanding. They’re putting pressure on the Kurds to hand over control over Afrin to Damascus. Russia wants all regions west of the river Euphrates to be under Syrian control. The Kurds rejected this demand. In response, Russia gave Turkey the go-ahead to attack Kurdish-controlled Afrin. They want to break the Kurdish resistance so they will relinquish control over the region. And the United States is doing nothing to stop this.

Why would Turkey want to help Russia and the Syrian regime? Turkey opposes Assad, after all.

Turkey’s only genuine enemy in Syria is the Kurds. Turkey allowed jihadi fighters to cross its border as early as 2011, as we have repeatedly reported. Turkey supports anything that harms the Kurds. Over a year ago, Turkey withdrew its armed forces from eastern Aleppo, which then was surrounded by President al-Assad’s troops to use them against the YPG and prevent Kurdish-controlled Afrin linking up with other Kurdish areas. By withdrawing its troops from Aleppo, Turkey effectively handed over the city to Damascus.

What can the Kurds now expect?

They’ll fight to the end. They have no other choice. They would have long since given in to Russian pressure if they were willing to do so. There are about 1.1 million civilians in Afrin: 600,000 Kurds and 500,000 Arab refugees. The YPG has about 10,000 fighters in the area.

Rami Abdel Rahman leads the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, which is affiliated with the opposition and relies on a network of activists and informants for its reporting. Many international news organizations and experts deem the SOHR’s reports credible. The critical security situation in Syria, however, often makes it impossible to independently verify this information.

Terrorist State of #Turkey say US needs to withdraw from #Syria’s Manbij region immediately: Turkish FM

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The United States needs to withdraw from northern Syria’s Manbij region immediately, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said on Jan. 27.

President Tayyip Erdoğan on Jan. 26 had said Turkish forces would sweep Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) militia from the Syrian border and could push all the way east to the frontier with Iraq, including Manbij.

Speaking to reporters, Çavuşoğlu also said Turkey wanted to see concrete steps by the United States to end its support for the YPG militia.

“We want to see more concrete steps rather than words. The U.S. must cut ties with the terrorist organization,” Çavuşoğlu told reporters before a meeting in the Mediterranean province of Antalya.

Ankara said earlier it had been told by U.S. National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster that Washington would not provide the YPG with weapons anymore.

Source: http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/us-needs-to-withdraw-from-syrias-manbij-region-immediately-turkish-fm-126385

Kurdish YPG rocket hit back at Turkey town Kilis dozen Injured

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More than a dozen people have been wounded when two rockets fired from Syria’s Kurdish-controlled enclave of Afrin struck a Turkish border town, the local governor says.

Governor Mehmet Tekinarslan said that the rockets hit two locations, including a mosque during prayer times, in the city center of Kilis on Wednesday.

At least eight people were wounded at the mosque and another five injured at the second location, he added. Two of the injured people were in critical condition.

Turkish media footage showed security forces clearing the areas of civilians following the attacks.

Several rockets have hit the Turkish border towns of Kilis and Reyhanli in recent days as Ankara presses ahead with its operation against US-backed Kurdish militants in the war-torn Arab country.

On Saturday, rockets fired across the border hit Reyhanli, killing a Syrian national and wounding 46 people. Another five were wounded when rockets hit Kilis.

Turkey launched the so-called Operation Olive Branch in Afrin five days ago in a bid to eliminate the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), which Ankara views as a terror organization and the Syrian branch of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

The YPG forms the backbone of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), a US-backed anti-Damascus militant group.

The Turkish military said in a statement on Tuesday that at least 260 members of the YPG and the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group had been killed in the Afrin operation. The SDF has also claimed to kill dozens of Turkish forces and allied Free Syrian Army members.

Operation Olive Branch in the Afrin region is Turkey’s second major military intervention in Syria during an unprecedented foreign-backed militancy that broke out in 2011.

In August 2016, Turkey began a unilateral military intervention in northern Syria, code-named Operation Euphrates Shield, sending tanks and warplanes across the border. Ankara claimed that its military campaign was aimed at pushing Daesh from Turkey’s border with Syria and stopping the advance of Kurdish forces, who were themselves fighting Daesh.

Turkey ended its campaign in northern Syria in March 2017, but at the time did not rule out the possibility of yet another act of military offensive inside the Arab country.

Terrorist State of Turkey claim it killed 260 Kurdish fighters in Syria

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As Turkey continues its offensive in Syria’s Kurdish enclave of Afrin, Ankara says it has killed 260 enemy fighters. Washington and Moscow have called for restraint as the United Nations readies aid supplies.

Turkey’s military said on Tuesday it has killed at least 260 Syrian Kurdish fighters and “Islamic State” (IS) militants in the first four days of operations in northwest Syria’s Kurdish-dominated region of Afrin.

There is no known IS presence in Afrin, which is under the control of the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG).

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights described the fighting as “very violent” to the northeast, northwest and southwest of Afrin, which lies adjacent to Turkey’s southern border.

The Observatory said 28 civilians were killed; a number vehemently denied by the Ankara government which insists it is only targeting militants. The monitoring group also said 43 Turkish-backed rebels had been killed as well as 38 Kurdish fighters, a number far lower than that provided by the Turkish military. Three Turkish soldiers have been killed since the offensive began on Saturday.

Artillery and drone strikes

The Turkish military and their Syrian rebel allies on Wednesday continued an offensive against the YPG, which the US is backing in the fight against IS, but who Ankara accuses of links to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party waging a more than three decade fight in Turkey.

The military offensive has opened up a new front in Syria’s seven-year war, which could extend wider still and lead to a confrontation between Turkey and its NATO ally the US.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on Tuesday said the operation could spread into the town of Manbij to the east, where some US troops are positioned alongside the SDF. He reiterated Ankara’s call for Washington to stop supporting the YPG.