Turkey: Reaching limits but will keep taking in refugees

Syrian government troops advanced Sunday toward a rebel town near the Turkish border as they pressed a Russian-backed offensive that has prompted tens of thousands to flee, a monitor said.

A senior official says Turkey is caring for some 30,000 to 35,000 displaced Syrians on the Syrian side of the border but has no immediate plans to let them in.

A Syrian baby is carried as the family arrives at the Bab al-Salam border crossing with Turkey, in Syria, Saturday, Feb. 6, 2016.

Turkey is said to be home to a total of 3 million refugees, including nearly 2.5 million Syrians.

Turkey said another Russian warplane violated its airspace a week ago, and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned Moscow that it would be forced to “endure the consequences” if its jets continue to violate Turkish airspace. “Where else should we go?” “[The alternative is that] they will die under the bombardments and Turkey will contribute to this oppression by just watching like the western world does”.

Yesterday about 15,000 Syrians were waiting on the Syrian side of Turkey’s Oncupinar border crossing and up to 50,000 more were on their way, an official with the Turkish disaster agency AFAD told reporters.

Aid officials at the Oncupinar border crossing said their efforts for now were focused on getting aid to the Syrian side of the border, where Turkish agencies have set up new shelters.

The Latest on the fighting in Syria, where government forces are waging a massive offensive around the northern city of Aleppo, once the country’s largest.

“People are sleeping out in the open in the freezing cold with little children”, she said.

“We have been frustrated at the slow pace of confronting Daesh”, said Anwar Gargash, using the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State. The territorial gains have driven a west-east wedge into rebel-held areas and brought the government a step closer to being able to encircle contested Aleppo.

He was speaking on the sidelines of an informal meeting of European Union defense ministers in Amsterdam.

The Syrian uprising began in March 2011 with mostly peaceful protests but escalated into a full-blown civil war after a harsh government crackdown.

As the Syrian armed conflict enters its fifth year, the embattled Assad-led regime appears poised to tilt the war to its favor propped up by Russia’s overt participation through air strikes as well as ground support by Hezbollah and Iran.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs estimates that 40,000 people have already been displaced by the ongoing fighting in Aleppo. But there is no sign that Russian Federation is pulling back and as opposition fighters retreat, the Assad regime is strengthened and thousands more civilians will flee, hoping for sanctuary in Turkey.

Asked if the UAE was ready to send troops if need be, Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Anwar Gargash said at a media briefing in the Emirati capital Abu Dhabi: “This has been our position throughout”.

Syria would resist any ground incursion into its territory and send the aggressors home “in coffins”, its foreign minister said on Saturday, comments clearly aimed at the UAE and Saudi Arabia.