Turkish troops are continuing to shell Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) positions in Syria’s Azaz district, located in the countryside north of Aleppo, Turkish security sources confirmed on Feb. 14.
The shelling was first reported on Feb. 13 night when Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu said the army had returned artillery fire after coming under attack by PYD forces based around Azaz in northern Syria. He had said the response was within Turkey’s rules of engagement.
According to the Turkish military, the Akcabağlar base in Turkey’s border province of Kilis was shelled on Feb. 13 by “PYD/PKK [the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party]” forces.
On Feb. 14 the Turkish army continued to shell PYD positions, military sources said. Artillery fire could also be heard in Kilis.
Turkish military sources added that several Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) positions had been destroyed and the militants also reportedly suffered casualties.
Azaz in Aleppo province has been the scene of recent heavy fighting and the YPG have advanced to Azaz, just six kilometers from the Turkish border.
Update: At least two sources confirm that Turkey also fired on the Syrian army on Saturday, an exceptionally provocative move.
Update: Washington has now weighed in and is asking the Turks to please stop shelling the soldiers the Pentagon is arming.
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Even as all sides – including the US, Russia, Saudi Arabia, and select rebel groups – pretend to be working towards a ceasefire and a diplomatic solution to the five year conflict in Syria, actions speak louder than words, and to put it as succinctly as possible, everyone is still fighting.
In fact, the fighting is more intense than ever. Russia and Hezbollah are closing in on Aleppo, the country’s largest city and a key urban center where rebels are dug in for what amounts to a last stand. If the city is liberated by the government (and yes, “liberated” is more accurate than “falls” because occupied territory belongs to the Syrian government, not to Sunni extremists), Assad will have regained control of the country’s backbone in the west.
That would effectively mean the end of the rebellion and the Gulf monarchies, not to mention Turkey, are not happy about it. “The main battle is about cutting the road between Aleppo and Turkey, for Turkey is the main conduit of supplies for the terrorists,” Assad said in an interview with AFP on Friday.
That supply line has been severed and now, it’s do or die time for the rebels’ Sunni benefactors in Ankara, Riyadh, and Doha. Either intervene or watch as Hezbollah rolls up the opposition under cover of Russian airstrikes, restoring the Assad government and securing the Shiite crescent for the Iranians.
As we documented extensively this week, the Saudis and the Turks are now set to invade. Assad has promised to “confront them”, which of course means that the IRGC and Hassan Nasrallah’s army are set to come into direct contact with Turkish and Saudi troops, setting the stage for an all-out sectarian war that will almost invariably end up pitting NATO against the Russians. Note that this is different from Yemen, where Tehran fights via proxies rather than directly against the Saudi military.
On Saturday the stakes were raised when Turkey said Saudi Arabia is set to send warplanes to Incirlik.
As a reminder, access to Incirlik was the carrot Erdogan used last summer to convince NATO to acquiesce to Ankara’s brutal crackdown on the PKK. “Let me wage war against my political rivals, and you can use our airbase,” is a fair approximation of Erdogan’s proposition.
Now, it appears the Saudis are set to use the base as a staging ground for strikes in Syria.
As RT reports, “Saudi Arabia is to deploy military jets and personnel to Turkey’s Incirlik Air Base in the south of the country.”
Of course the excuse is the same as it ever was for everyone involved: the fight against ISIS.
“The deployment is part of the US-led effort to defeat the Islamic State terrorist group,” Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said. “At every coalition meeting, we have always emphasized the need for an extensive result-oriented strategy in the fight against the Daesh terrorist group,” he added.
Cavusoglu was speaking to the Yeni Safak newspaper after addressing the 52nd Munich Security Conference where over 60 foreign and defense ministers are gathered (see here for more from the meeting).
“If we have such a strategy, then Turkey and Saudi Arabia may launch a ground operation,” he added.
Remember that Ankara’s primary concern in the country is ensuring that the YPG (i.e. the Kurdish opposition that Erdogan equates with the PKK and thus with “terrorism”) doesn’t end up declaring a sovereign state on Turkey’s border. That, Erdogan fears, may embolden Kurds in Turkey who are already pushing for more autonomy.
In short: somehow, Turkey and Saudi Arabia need to figure out how to spin an attack on the YPG and an effort to rescue the opposition at Aleppo as an anti-ISIS operation even though ISIS doesn’t have a large presence in the area.
How they plan to do that is anyone’s guess, but the following tweets should tell you everything you need to know about where this is headed.
As you can see, Turkey has begun shelling Aleppo in what is indeed a very serious escalation that will likely prompt a Russian response.
“Shelling was reported at Menagh air base, a former Syrian Air Force facility that Kurds seized from Islamist rebels just days ago, and at three other positions between the airport and Turkish border,” The Independent reports. “The air base has been a key target for several parties in the Syrian civil war since 2012, being besieged by rebels for almost a year until it was seized by a coalition including an early form of Isis and the al-Qaeda-linked Jabhat al-Nusra in August 2013 [and] it remained in rebel hands until Thursday, when Kurdish PYD fighters capitalised on the diversion caused by Bashar al-Assad’s forces and Russian air strikes attacking rebel areas to the south to seize Menagh.”
PM Davutoglu says the shelling was in line with “rules of engagement.”
A Kurdish official confirmed the shelling of Menagh air base in the northern Aleppo countryside, which he said had been captured by the Kurdish-allied Jaysh al-Thuwwar group rather than the Kurdish YPG militia,” Reuters says, adding that “Both are part of the Syria Democratic Forces alliance.” That group, you’re reminded, was the subject of intense scrutiny late last year as we documented in our classic piece “Full Metal Retard: US Launches “Performance-Based” Ammo Paradrop Program For Make-Believe ‘Syrian Arabs.'” It’s the same group the US has been paradropping weapons to.
To sum up, Turkey is deliberately attempting to reverse gains made by the US-backed Kurds in an area that is under siege by the Russians and Iran. Or, more simply: utter chaos.
The Syrian government has confirmed that its army positions were targeted by Turkish shelling on Saturday, which also hit the positions of the Syrian Kurdish militias in the northern Aleppo province. Turkish shelling reportedly continued Sunday.
The Syrian government has condemned the Turkish shelling of Syrian territory and described it as direct support for “terrorist” groups, Syrian state media reported Sunday, citing a letter to the United Nations.
“Turkish artillery shelled Syrian territory, targeting Syrian Kurdish positions and the positions of the Syrian Arab Army,” the letter stated.
Damascus sent the letter in response to Saturday’s Turkish shelling of areas north of Aleppo recently captured by a Kurdish-backed alliance.
In the letter the Syrian government condemned statements by Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu as “blatant interference” in Syrian affairs.
Turkish military sources told Anadolu Agency that the shelling was continuing Sunday and several positions of YPG – the military wing of the Kurdish Democratic Union (PYD) – have been destroyed. The militias reportedly suffered a number of casualties, the sources added.
Source: Turkish military repeatedly shell Assad forces; Kurds confirm to RT being hit by massive attack — RT News
The Turkish army has shelled Syrian government forces in Aleppo and Latakia provinces, while also hitting Kurdish targets near the city of Azaz in northwestern Syria, including an air base recently retaken from Islamist rebels, with a massive attack.
Anatolia news agency reported that the Turkish military hit Syrian government forces on Saturday, adding that the shelling had been in response to fire inflicted on a Turkish military guard post in Turkey’s southern Hatay region.
Turkish artillery targeted Syrian forces again late on Saturday, according to a military source quoted by RIA Novosti. The attack targeted the town of Deir Jamal in the Aleppo Governorate.
The agency also cited details of an earlier attack on Syrian government army positions in northwestern Latakia.
“Turkey’s artillery opened fire on the positions of the Syrian Army in the vicinity of Aliya mountain in the northwestern part of the province of Latakia,” the source said.
Meanwhile, the Turkish shelling of Kurdish positions continued for more than three hours almost uninterruptedly, a Kurdish source told RT, adding that the Turkish forces are using mortars and missiles and firing from the Turkish border not far from the city of Azaz in the Aleppo Governorate.
The shelling targeted the Menagh military air base and the nearby village of Maranaz, where “many civilians were wounded,” local journalist Barzan Iso told RT. He added that Kurdish forces and their allies among “the Syrian democratic forces” had taken control of the air base on Thursday.
According to Iso, the Menagh base had previously been controlled by the Ahrar ash-Sham Islamist rebel group, which seized it in August of 2013. The journalist also added that Ahrar ash-Sham militants at the base had been supported by Al-Nusra terrorists and some extremist groups coming from Turkey.
Ahrar ash-Sham is a militant group that has trained teenagers to commit acts of terror in Damascus, Homs, and Latakia provinces, according to data provided to the Russian Defense Ministry by Syrian opposition forces.
The group, which has intensified its attacks on the Syrian government forces since January, was getting “serious reinforcements from Turkey,” Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said during a briefing in Moscow on January 21.
A source in the Turkish government confirmed to Reuters that the Turkish military had shelled Kurdish militia targets near Azaz on Saturday.
“The Turkish Armed Forces fired shells at PYD positions in the Azaz area,” the source said, referring to the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), which Ankara views as a terrorist group.
A Turkish security official told Reuters that the shelling of the Kurds had been a response to a shelling of Turkish border military outposts by the PYD and forces loyal to Damascus, as required under Turkish military rules of engagement.
Turkey’s PM Davutoglu also confirmed that the country’s forces had struck Syrian Kurdish fighters and demanded that the Kurds retreat from all of the areas that they had recently seized.
“The YPG will immediately withdraw from Azaz and the surrounding area and will not go close to it again,” he told reporters, adding that Turkey “will retaliate against every step [by the YPG],” Reuters reports.
A Kurdish official confirmed to Reuters that the shelling had targeted the Menagh air base located south of Azaz.
According to the official, the base had been captured by the Jaysh al-Thuwwar rebel group, which is an ally of PYD and a member of the Syria Democratic Forces alliance.
Syrian Kurds are actively engaged in the fight against the Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) terrorist group and have been recently described as “some of the most successful” forces fighting IS jihadists in Syria by US State Department spokesman John Kirby, AFP reports.
Earlier, the US also called the PYD an “important partner” in the fight against Islamic State, adding that US support of the Kurdish fighters “will continue.”
Turkey’s shelling of the Syrian Kurds comes just days after a plan to end hostilities in Syria was presented in Munich after a meeting of the so-called International Syria Support Group (ISSG), in which Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, US Secretary of State John Kerry, and UN Special Envoy on Syria Staffan de Mistura participated.
‘We will strike PYD’ – Turkish PM
Earlier on Saturday, Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu threatened Syrian Kurds with military action, saying that Turkey will resort to force against the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) if it considers the step “necessary.”
“As I have said, the link between the YPG and the [outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party] PKK is obvious. If the YPG threatens our security, then we will do what is necessary,” Davutoglu said on February 10, as quoted by the Hurriyet Daily.
“The leadership cadre and ideology of the PKK and PYD is the same,” he argued in a televised speech in the eastern city of Erzincan on Saturday, AFP reports.
Davutoglu also said that if there is a threat to Turkey, “we will strike PYD like we did Qandil,” referring to a bombing campaign waged by Turkey against the PKK in its Qandil mountain stronghold in northern Iraq, Daily Sabah reports.
Turkey regards the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its military wing, the YPG, as affiliates of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has waged a decade-long insurgency against Turkish authorities, demanding autonomy for Turkish Kurds.
The latest developments come as Turkey continues a relentless crackdown on Kurds in its southeastern region. Ankara launched a military operation against Kurdish insurgents from the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in July of 2015, breaking a ceasefire signed in 2013.
Turkey’s General Staff claim that Turkish forces killed more than 700 PKK rebels during the offensive in the southeastern districts of Cizre and Sur. Meanwhile, Amnesty International has reported that at least 150 civilians, including women in children, were killed in the Turkish military operation, adding that over 200,000 lives have been put at risk.
According to the Turkish Human Rights Foundation, at least 198 civilians, including 39 children, have been murdered in the area since August of 2015.
The foreign ministers of Germany, Russia and the UK attending a security conference in Munich gave conflicting views on how likely the negotiated ceasefire in Syria would hold and who it would depend on.
Responding to a question on how likely the Syrian Army and so-called moderate rebel groups are to observe the ceasefire negotiated by world powers, Germany’s Frank-Walter Steinmeier simply said, “51 percent.”
Sergey Lavrov, his Russian counterpart, was reluctant to voice any percentage, and said any success in the peace process would depend on the US military finally agreeing on coordinating their actions in Syria with Russia.
He said that while his counterpart, Secretary of State John Kerry, in his Munich speech earlier said that military cooperation with Russia is what the US wants in Syria, statements from the Pentagon directly contradicted it. Moreover, the US insists on continuing its own military action in Syria while demanding that Russia put its campaign on hold, even though both campaigns are targeting terrorist groups.
“The fact that the discourse around this ceasefire is drifting toward prioritizing the halt of the operations of the Russian Air Forces makes me strongly suspect that our peace effort would end in a sour way. If the military are not maintaining an honest day-to-day contact… nothing can be achieved,” Lavrov said.
“If the Americans try to play it back now, it would be their responsibility,” he added.
Moderator Wolfgang Ischinger joked: “Sounds like a little less than 50 percent,” to which Lavrov glumly replied: “Forty-nine.”
“I don’t speak Russian, but I was judging something close to zero,” commented the third member of the panel, UK Foreign Secretary Philip Hammond.
He proceeded to say that it was Russia who can finally make or break the ceasefire, accusing Moscow of bombing the same moderate opposition that it expects to observe the ceasefire, an allegation that Russia denies.
“Whatever you call it, whatever the justification, whatever the language – over the last weeks Russia has been bombing the moderate opposition positions. In the name of fighting terrorism, whatever,” Hammond said. “Unless Russia over the next days is going to stop or at least significantly scale back that bombing, the moderate armed opposition will not join in this process.”
Ironically, Russia has been trying for months to get the sponsors of the “moderate Syrian opposition” provide the Russian military with accurate list of the armed groups, which should be considered moderate enough to be negotiated with, and their positions so that Russia wouldn’t bomb them. This information is exactly what Lavrov said the Pentagon is withholding from the Russian military, despite all Moscow’s requests.
What is collectively called the Syrian rebels are a fluid and disorganized assortment of armed groups with conflicting agendas and shifting allegiances. Agreeing who should be at the negotiations table was a major challenge during the organization of the peace talks in Munich, and eventually only the terrorist group Islamic State and the Al-Qaeda branch in Syria, the Nusra Front, were explicitly excluded.
Turkey’s military has shelled Kurdish militia targets near the town of Azaz in northern Syria. (Photo: Today’s Zaman)
Turkey’s military has shelled Kurdish militia targets near the town of Azaz in northern Syria, a Turkish government source told Reuters on Saturday, without elaborating on the extent of the shelling or why it had been carried out.
“The Turkish Armed Forces fired shells at PYD positions in the Azaz area,” the source said, referring to the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), which Ankara regards as a terrorist organization.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported that the shelling had targeted a Syrian air base and a village captured from insurgents in recent days by the YPG militia, which is backed by the PYD.
A Kurdish official confirmed the shelling of northern Aleppo’s Menagh air base, which he said had been captured by the Kurdish-allied Jaysh al-Thuwwar group rather than the YPG. Both are part of the Syria Democratic Forces alliance.
News of the shelling came after Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Saturday Turkey would not hesitate to act in Syria if it faced a threat from Syrian Kurdish forces.
His comments reflected Ankara’s growing frustration with United States backing for the PYD, which controls most of the Syrian side of the border with Turkey and which Ankara views as tied to militants fighting an insurgency in southeast Turkey.
Saudi Arabia is to deploy military jets and personnel to Turkey’s Incirlik Air Base in the south of the country, Ankara said. The base is already used by the US Air Force for their sorties in Syria.
The deployment is part of the US-led effort to defeat the Islamic State terrorist group, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said.
“At every coalition meeting, we have always emphasized the need for an extensive result-oriented strategy in the fight against the Daesh terrorist group,” he said, referring to IS by an Arabic-language abbreviation.
Cavusoglu spoke to the Yeni Şafak newspaper after addressing a security conference in Munich, Germany, where the Syrian crisis was one of the top issues on the agenda.
“If we have such a strategy, then Turkey and Saudi Arabia may launch a ground operation,” he added, fueling concerns that a foreign troop invasion may soon further complicate the already turbulent situation in the war-torn country.
Earlier, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain and the UAE voiced their readiness to contribute troops for a ground operation in Syria on the condition that the US would lead the intervention. Damascus and its key regional ally, Iran, warned that such a foreign force would face strong resistance.
The US, Turkey and Saudi Arabia have shared goals in Syria, as all three want the government of Syrian President Bashar Assad to be toppled by rebel forces. On other issues they differ. For example, the US supports Kurdish forces in Syria who scored significant military victories against IS, but Turkey considers them terrorists and is targeting them with airstrikes.
Russia, which supports the government of Bashar Assad, seeing it as the only regional force capable of defeating IS on the ground, has warned against a ground intervention, which, Moscow believes, would only serve to prolong the war in Syria.
Speaking at the Munich Security Conference, Russian PM Dmitry Medvedev called on his Western counterparts “not to threaten a ground operation” in Syria, stressing that Moscow is doing its utmost to pave the way for a lasting peace in the war-torn country.
Russia and other leading world powers have brought Damascus and a number of rebel groups to negotiations and leveraged them into agreeing to a ceasefire. The agreement, however, remains shaky, as neither side trusts the other, and the unity of the rebel delegation remains questionable. The terrorist groups IS and Al Nusra Front are not part of the talks.
An ambitious plan to end hostilities in Syria with verifiable results within a week, revive the Geneva-3 peace talks, and immediately begin delivering humanitarian aid to civilians has been unveiled in Munich, Germany after talks including the US, Russia, and the UN.
Hostilities in Syria could come to a halt within a week after confirmation by the government of President Bashar Assad and the opposition, according to an official communiqué from the International Syria Support Group (ISSG) meeting.
A mechanism to help resolve humanitarian issues in Syria has been developed, which includes the creation of a task force that will begin work on Friday.
A press conference was held after the meeting of the so-called Syria Support Group, with the participation of Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, US Secretary of State John Kerry, and UN Special Envoy on Syria Staffan de Mistura.
Kerry noted that the commitments agreed upon during the Munich meeting are only on paper and that the “real test” of progress will be to get all of the parties involved in the Syrian conflict to sign on and honor them.
Russia is counting on the US and other ISSG countries to put pressure on the Syrian opposition to cooperate with the UN, Lavrov said.
The main objective that everyone agrees on is to destroy Islamic State, Lavrov added. He also called the notion that the situation in Syria would improve if Assad’s regime was to abdicate an “illusion.”
Talk about the need to prepare ground troops for an invasion of Syria will only add fire to the conflict, Russia’s foreign minister stressed.
The aim now is to resume peace talks without preconditions between the Syrian government and the whole spectrum of the opposition, which is the only format in which they could be successful, Lavrov emphasized.
“The goal of resuming the negotiation process, which was suspended in an atmosphere where part of the [Syrian] opposition took a completely unconstructive position and tried to put forward preconditions, was stressed [at the ISSG meeting]. We noted [today] that the talks must resume as soon as possible in strict compliance with UN Security Council Resolution 2254, without any ultimatums or preconditions,” he said.
While Lavrov, Kerry and Mistura held a press conference to explain the results of the ISSG meeting, separate statements came from several EU leaders. Germany’s foreign minister, Frank-Walter Steinmeier, was quoted by Reuters as saying that the US and Russia should coordinate their military actions in Syria “more closely.”
Lavrov made clear that an end in hostilities in Syria would not mean a halt in anti-terrorist activities in the region. Operations against all groups designated by the UN as terrorists will continue, including the fight against Islamic State and Al-Nusra Front.
Lavrov added that militants are the only ones fleeing from the Syrian city of Aleppo, stressing that they have been receiving support from Turkey.
Meanwhile, Kerry argued that the Syrian government’s military advances would not be enough to win the war and urged for a peaceful resolution to conflict, as well as continued efforts to fight terrorism in the region.
During the press conference, both Russian and American diplomats employed a more friendly rhetoric, complementing their mutual efforts in Syria when it comes to delivering humanitarian by air and working to achieve progress in peace talks.
“We welcome the readiness of the US and other countries to join in the Russian-Syrian government operation to disseminate humanitarian aid from planes into the Syrian city of Deir ez-Zour, the location of the biggest number of citizens without humanitarian aid,” Lavrov stated.
Other options agreed upon include parachuting aid into other residential locations in need, Lavrov explained, adding that most of the efforts would have to be concentrated on the ground.
In turn, Kerry stressed that it was not Russia or Iran who had interfered with bringing a halt to hostilities in Syria.
Syria Support Group talks ran longer than expected on Thursday, beginning at 7 pm local time and running over five hours, before resuming again for the finalizing of a communique. The last Syria Support Group meeting was held in Vienna on November 14.
In the beginning of February, the United Nations temporarily suspended peace talks aimed at resolving Syria’s five-year civil war. The UN said that the process was to be resumed on February 25 and called on the sides involved to do more to acheive progress.
“I have concluded, frankly, that after the first week of preparatory talks, there is more work to be done, not only by us but by the stakeholders,” the UN mediator, Staffan de Mistura, said after meeting with the opposition delegation at a Geneva hotel.
The latest inconclusive Syrian peace talks were attended by representatives of the Syrian government, the Saudi-backed coalition, and the High Negotiation Committee (HNC), which sent 35 leading members, excluding Syrian Kurdish groups, along with some additional moderate opposition members supported by Russia. Turkey insisted on the exclusion of the Syrian Kurdish party, the PYD.
Russian PM warns against triggering ‘permanent war’ in Syria
Meanwhile, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev has warned against the initiation of any sort of foreign land operations in Syria, arguing that it could unleash “yet another war on Earth.”
“All sides must be compelled to sit at the negotiating table, instead of unleashing yet another war on Earth,” Medvedev told Germany’s Handelsblatt newspaper. “Any kinds of land operations, as a rule, lead to a permanent war. Look at what’s happened in Afghanistan and a number of other countries. I am not even going to bring up poor Libya.”
The PM was commenting on recent statements from Saudi Arabia claiming that it was ready to send ground troops to Syria.
“The Americans and our Arab partners must think well: do they want a permanent war? Do they think they can really quickly win it? It is impossible, especially in the Arab world. Everyone is fighting against everyone there,” Medvedev added.
Russia PM warns foreign offensive in Syria could spark ‘world war’ Dmitry Medvedev urges ceasefire talks, advises against Arab forces entering years-long conflict
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev (Alexander Astafiev/AFP)
Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev warned Thursday that if Arab forces entered the Syrian war, they could spark a “new world war” and urged ceasefire talks instead.
“The Americans and our Arabic partners must think hard about this: do they want a permanent war?” he was quoted as telling the German Handelsblatt business daily. “Do they really think they would win such a war very quickly?”
He added: “All sides must be forced to the negotiating table instead of sparking a new world war.”
Despite calling for peace talks, the most recent Russian-backed offensive, near Aleppo, prompted opposition groups to walk out of peace talks last month while forcing tens of thousands of civilians to flee toward the Turkish border.
A man eats food as Syrians fleeing the northern embattled city of Aleppo wait on February 6, 2016 in Bab Al-Salam, near the city of Azaz, northern Syria, near the Turkish border crossing.
(AFP/BULENT KILIC)
UN-sponsored peace talks are scheduled to restart in Geneva on February 25, although a spokesman for the Syrian opposition said last week that US President Barack Obama is seeking to halt Russia’s military onslaught first.
According to an upcoming report by the Syrian Center for Policy Research, more than one in every 10 Syrians has either been killed or injured during the ongoing bloody civil war there, and nearly half the population has been displaced.
According to the report, the brutal war has brought Syrian life expectancy down from 70 before the conflict to 55.4, and 45% of the prewar population has been forced to move — 6.36 million within Syria and a further 4 million who have fled overseas.
In this Oct. 22, 2015 file photo, a Russian Su-24 takes off on a combat mission at Hmeimim airbase in Syria. (AP Photo/Vladimir Isachenkov, File)
A pledging conference hosted in London a week ago by the United Kingdom, Germany, Norway, Kuwait and the UN raised $6 billion in pledges for humanitarian assistance with promises of continued support for more than 22.5 million people within Syria and across the region in 2016.
A further $5 billion was pledged for humanitarian and development programs through 2020.
Erdogan and his prime minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, are now paying the price for their miscalculated Islamist aspirations to install a Muslim Brotherhood type of Sunni regime in Syria in place of the non-Sunni Assad regime. Assad, with Russia’s help, has become somewhat untouchable, and has never been so safe and secure since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011. By contrast, the Turks now face a multitude of threats on both sides of an apocalyptic border.
“With the Middle East ravaged by religious radicalism and sectarianism, the European Union and the United States can’t afford the Turkish government’s brutal military efforts against the Kurds or its undemocratic war on academics and journalists. Only a secular, democratic Turkey that can provide a regional bulwark against radical groups will bring stability to both the Middle East and Europe. As Mr. Erdogan seeks to eliminate all opposition and create a single-party regime, the European Union and the United States must cease their policy of appeasement and ineffectual disapproval and frankly inform him that this is a dead end.” — Behlul Ozkan, assistant professor at Istanbul’s Marmara University, writing in the New York Times.
Six years ago, Turkey’s official narrative over its leaders’ Kodak-moment exchanges of pleasantries with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime in Damascus promised the creation of a Muslim bloc resembling the European Union. Border controls would disappear, trade would flourish, armies would carry out joint exercises, and Turks and Syrians on both sides of the border would live happily ever after. Instead, six years later, blood is flowing on both sides of the 900 kilometer border.
Inside Turkey, clashes between security forces and members of the youth wing of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) have been taking place for weeks. Many towns and neighborhoods have turned into ghost-towns, as strict curfews are now in place. As a result, tens of thousands of Kurds have been forced to flee their homes, seeking refuge in safer parts of the country. While the Turkish army struggles to diffuse the latest Kurdish urban rebellion, hundreds of Kurdish militants and members of Turkey’s security forces have lost their lives.
Worse, the conflict has the potential to trigger further violence in Turkey’s non-eastern regions, where there is a vast Kurdish population spread across large cities.
Already in Istanbul, violence erupted on February 2, 2016, when unidentified gunmen opened fire on the campus of an Islamic association; they killed one man and wounded three others. In a second incident in a suburb of Istanbul, two people were killed and seven wounded after armed assailants fired on a tea-house.
Across the border in northern Syria, Turkey’s “Kurdish problem” is equally pressing. The PKK’s Syrian faction, the Democratic Union Party (PYD), has been successfully fighting on the front-lines alongside the Western alliance that is waging war on the Islamic State (IS), and making itself highly regarded by the alliance, thereby further angering Ankara.
Turkey, which views the PYD as a terrorist organization like the PKK, fears that the Syrian Kurds’ fight against IS could, in the near future, earn the PYD international legitimacy.
On February 1, Brett McGurk, the U.S. envoy to the coalition against IS, visited a part of Kurdish-controlled northern Syria. On his visit, McGurk posed in front of cameras with a PYD commander — all smiles — while receiving an honorary plaque. The ceremony lent further legitimacy to the PYD. McGurk’s actions greatly angered Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. In a statement directed towards Washington, Erdogan asked: “How will we trust [you]? Am I your partner or are the terrorists in Kobane [the Kurdish town in northern Syria]?”
Ironically, Syrian Kurds are not only backed by the U.S., but also by Russia, which became another Turkish nightmare. On November 24, 2015, two Turkish F-16 jets shot down a Russian Su-24 military jet flying along Turkey’s border with Syria. Turkey justified its actions against Russia, citing a violation of Turkish airspace. Russian President Vladimir Putin pledged to punish Turkey by means “other than” a slew of severe commercial sanctions.
Immediately after the November 24th incident, in a clear signal to Turkey, Moscow began to reinforce its military deployments in Syria and on the eastern Mediterranean. These included installations of S-400 anti-aircraft and anti-missile defense batteries, lying in wait for the first Turkish plane to fly over Syrian skies, in order to shoot it down in front of the cameras. Russia’s scare tactics worked. The Turks halted their airstrikes against IS strongholds in Syria.
On January 29, 2016, another Russian jet, this time a Su-34, violated Turkish airspace and was not shot down. The Turks, already uneasy over tensions with Russia, did not pull the trigger. Most observers agree that the second violation and Turkey’s failure to shoot, despite earlier pledges that “all foreign aircraft violating Turkish airspace would be shot down,” was a major humiliation on the part of Ankara.
Left: A Russian Su-24 bomber explodes as it is hit by a missile fired from a Turkish F-16 fighter, on Nov. 24, 2015. Right: A Russian Su-34 fighter jet. On Jan. 29, 2016, a Russian Su-34 violated Turkish airspace and was not shot down, despite earlier pledges that “all foreign aircraft violating Turkish airspace would be shot down.”
Much to Turkey’s discomfort, the Russians are playing a tough game in Syria. Most recently, the Russian military deployed at least four advanced Sukhoi Su-35S Flanker-E aircraft to Syria; the move — shortly after the January violation of Turkish airspace by the Su-34 — further augmented its air superiority and boldly challenging Ankara.
“Starting from last week, super-maneuverable Su-35S fighter jets started performing combat missions at Khmeimim airbase,” Russian Defense Ministry spokesman Maj. Gen. Igor Konashenkov told the TASS news agency on February 1. But a more humiliating move by Moscow was to come: Russian forces in Syria bombed “moderate” anti-Assad Islamist groups, as well as Turkmen (ethnic Turks) in northwestern Syria.
Russian airstrikes have reinforced Assad’s forces that now encircle Aleppo, a strategic city in the north. More than 70,000 Syrians, mostly Turkmen, fled from their villages to the Turkish border to seek refuge inside Turkey, and potentially add to the country’s refugee problem. Turkey is home to more than 2.5 million Syrians who have fled the civil war. It is estimated that at least one million more would flee to Turkey if Aleppo fell to Assad’s forces.
Erdogan and his prime minister, Ahmet Davutoglu, are now paying the price for their miscalculated Islamist aspirations to install a Muslim Brotherhood type of Sunni regime in Syria in place of the non-Sunni Assad regime. Assad, with Russia’s help, has become somewhat untouchable and has never been so safe and secure since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011. By contrast, the Turks now face a multitude of threats on both sides of an apocalyptic border.
“With the Middle East ravaged by religious radicalism and sectarianism, the European Union and the United States can’t afford the Turkish government’s brutal military efforts against the Kurds or its undemocratic war on academics and journalists. Only a secular, democratic Turkey that can provide a regional bulwark against radical groups will bring stability to both the Middle East and Europe. As Mr. Erdogan seeks to eliminate all opposition and create a single-party regime, the European Union and the United States must cease their policy of appeasement and ineffectual disapproval and frankly inform him that this is a dead end.”
Burak Bekdil, based in Ankara, is a Turkish columnist for the Hürriyet Daily and a Fellow at the Middle East Forum.
Left: A Russian Su-24 bomber explodes as it is hit by a missile fired from a Turkish F-16 fighter, on Nov. 24, 2015. Right: A Russian Su-34 fighter jet. On Jan. 29, 2016, a Russian Su-34 violated Turkish airspace and was not shot down, despite earlier pledges that “all foreign aircraft violating Turkish airspace would be shot down.”
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