Kurds flee Turkish airstrikes
Humanitarian crisis warning ahead of Syrian border attack
Turkey has launched airstrikes, fired artillery and begun a ground offensive against Kurdish fighters in northern Syria after US troops pulled back from the area, paving the way for an assault on forces that have long been allied with the United States.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan yesterday announced the start of the campaign, which followed the abrupt decision on Monday by US President Donald Trump to essentially abandon the Syrian Kurdish fighters, leaving them vulnerable to a Turkish offensive that was widely condemned around the world.
The decision drew opposition from all sides at home. It also marked a stark change in rhetoric by Trump, who during a press conference in New York last year vowed to stand by the Kurds, who have been the only US allies in Syria fighting Isis (Islamic State). Trump said at the time that the Kurds “fought with us” and “died with us”, and insisted the US would never forget.
After Erdogan announced the offensive, Trump called the operation “a bad idea”. He later said he didn’t want to be involved in “endless, senseless wars”.
In northern Syria, residents of the border areas were in a panic and got out on foot, in cars and with rickshaws piled with mattresses and a few belongings. It was a wrenchingly familiar scenario for the many who, only a few years ago, had fled the advances on their towns and villages by Isis.
Plumes of smoke could be seen rising near the town of Qamishli and clashes continued amid intense shelling as Turkey struck at least six different border towns. At least seven civilians and three members of the Kurdish-led force known as the Syrian Democratic Forces were killed in the Turkish bombardment, Kurdish activists and a Syria war monitor said.
Turkey’s campaign — in which a Nato member rained down bombs on an area where hundreds of US troops had been stationed — drew immediate criticism and calls for restraint from Europe. In his statement, Trump emphasised that there are no American soldiers in the immediate area under attack.
“Our mission is to prevent the creation of a terror corridor across our southern border, and to bring peace to the area,” Erdogan said in a tweet announcing what he called “Operation Peace Spring”. He said that Turkish forces, with Ankara-backed Syrian fighters known as the Syrian National Army, had begun to eradicate what he called “the threat of terror” against Turkey.
Mustafa Bali, a spokesman for the US-backed SDF, said Turkish warplanes were targeting “civilian areas” in northern Syria and that shells also had fallen near a prison guarded by Kurds and holding some of the most dangerous Isis militants.
In Washington, officials said two British militants believed to be part of an Isis group that beheaded hostages and was known as “The Beatles” had been moved out of a detention centre in Syria and were in US custody.
Before Turkey’s attack, Syrian Kurdish forces who control nearly 30 per cent of Syria’s territory warned of a “humanitarian catastrophe”. More than 2 million people live in the area impacted by the attacks, according to aid groups.
The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said those killed in the Turkish bombardments included two Christian Assyrians in Qamishli, a married couple and their child, a man in a village outside the town of Tal Abyad, and a child in a village west of Qamishli.
The Turkish operation is meant to create a “safe zone” but carries the risk for Turkey of getting its forces even more deeply involved in the Syria war. It threatens to displace hundreds of thousands and ignite new fighting in the 8-year-old war.
A resident of Tal Abyad said one of the bombs hit an SDF post, and he fled with his wife and mother by car to Raqqa, nearly 100km to the south, to flee the bombing. The resident, who gave his name as Maher, said the road to Raqqa was packed with vehicles and families, some fleeing on foot “to get away from the bombing”. “People fled and left everything behind,” he said.
Turkey has long threatened to attack the Kurdish fighters that Ankara considers terrorists allied with a Kurdish insurgency in Turkey.
Expectations of an invasion increased after Trump’s announcement on Monday, although the US President also threatened to “totally destroy and obliterate” Turkey’s economy if the Turkish push went too far.
Nato Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg, while noting that Turkey “has legitimate security concerns” after suffering “horrendous terrorist attacks” and hosting thousands of refugees, said the country should not “further destabilise the region” with its military action in Syria.
The European Union is paying Turkey €6 billion ($10.45b) to help the country cope with almost 4 million Syrian refugees on its territory in exchange for stopping migrants leaving for Europe.
In its call for a general mobilisation, the local civilian Kurdish authority known as the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria asked the global community to fulfil its responsibilities and for the US-led coalition to set up a no-fly zone in northeastern Syria to protect the civilian population from Turkish airstrikes.
The Syrian Kurdish group urged Moscow to broker talks with the Syrian Government in Damascus in light of the Turkish operation. The Syrian Kurdish-led administration said it viewed positively calls from Moscow encouraging the Kurds and the Syrian Government to settle their difference through talks.
Syria’s Foreign Ministry condemned Turkey’s military strike, calling it a “blatant violation” of international law and vowing to repel the incursion.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov accused Washington of playing “very dangerous games” with the Syrian Kurds, saying the US first propped up the Kurdish “quasi state” in Syria and now is withdrawing support.
“Such reckless attitude to this highly sensitive subject can set fire to the entire region, and we have to avoid it at any cost,” he said in Kazakhstan.