Reports on Syrian regime’s involvement in Syria’s Afrin ‘unrealistic’: Turkish official

CGTN’s Michal Bardavid reports from Istanbul.

Turkey’s offensive against a Kurdish militia in northern Syria will enter a second month Tuesday having made little progress while straining relations with Washington and The European Union. Barak Barfi, a research fellow at New America Foundation, discusses with CGTN’s Susan Roberts.

It added that a total of 674 “terrorist targets” had also been destroyed in airstrikes since the start of the operation.

Pro-Syrian government militias were set to enter Afrin on Monday to oppose “Turkish aggression”, Syrian state media reported, while Ankara-backed rebels fighting in the northwestern Kurdish enclave said that they would “continue operations” regardless. Footage of Turkish military forces collaborating with Islamic extremist militant groups has come across social media on several occasions and not long ago the body of a female YPG fighter was desecrated by Turkish proxies, the Free Syrian Army (FSA).

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has previously threatened to expand the operation to include the YPG-held town of Manbij and other towns leading to the Iraqi border.

Speaking after the Cabinet meeting, Deputy Prime Minister and government spokesman Bekir Bozdağ said Turkey is following the situation closely and there has been no official confirmation from Damascus over reports on the regime’s involvement in Afrin.

Turkey says the YPG is a “terrorist” offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has waged an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984.

The move may prompt Turkey to curtail its weeks-long ground assault against the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces alliance, but also creates the potential for more fighting and military miscalculations.

Another Syrian Kurdish political official said on Monday that pressure from Russian Federation, the key ally of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, had prevented the deal from going ahead so far.

There has, however, been dispute between the Syrian regime and the Kurds over the latter’s presence, with demands from Damascus that the YPG hands over security control to the Syrian force, allows in regime officials and flies the Syrian flag to show that it acknowledges Syrian rule.

Jia Kurd said there is opposition to the deal that could prevent it from being implemented.

In August 2016, Turkey began a unilateral military intervention in northern Syria, code-named Operation Euphrates Shield, sending tanks and warplanes across the border.

Syrian state TV reported that rebels fired dozens of mortar rounds and rockets at Damascus, wounding eight people.

SANA gave no further details about the deployment of the troops, known as “popular forces”, to the area.

“The readiness for close coordination of the efforts of Russia, Turkey and Iran was confirmed with a view to ensuring the effective functioning of the de-escalation zones and the promotion of the political process”, the Kremlin statement said.