Assad ‘main contributor’ to terror: Syrian opposition
Regime airstrikes spark Turkish fears of ‘new refugee wave’
free. As such, the Russians, as well as the Iranians, may be in for tough times.”
Turkey summoned on Tuesday the ambassadors of Russia and Iran to complain about the regime advances, which it said are in violation of a “deescalation” agreement in Idlib reached by Ankara, Moscow and Tehran.
Meanwhile, the Syrian Negotiation Commission (SNC), during its meetings with the UN in New York, has warned that the UN-led Syrian peace process in Geneva risks being undermined by a “parallel process” — the Russia-led talks, the next meeting of which is due to take place in Sochi.
The SNC called for international pressure on the regime to negotiate in Geneva, said Al-Aridi.
In a separate development, thousands of refugees are fleeing north from Syria’s Idlib province toward the Turkish border in the wake of prolonged airstrikes by the Syrian regime.
Kerem Kinik, president of the Turkish Red Crescent Society, told Arab News that, over the last two weeks, roughly 64,000 Syrians have traveled from the south of Idlib toward the north.
“The majority of these people were settled next to their parents, while some have remained homeless,” he said. “We are doing our best to accommodate them in our camp between Idlib and Turkey’s southern border.”
Omar Kadkoy, a research associate at the Ankara-based think tank TEPAV, said Idlib province is a unique case in the context of the Syrian war, as it is already home to around 1.1 million people internally displaced from other Syrian provinces.
Kadkoy warned of a “new wave” of displaced people whom he expects will settle on the border strip between Idlib and the Hatay.
“Turkey’s border with Syria has been shut for two years,” he told Arab News. “But Ankara has not abandoned the Syrian refugees; a safe-haven strip emerged between Idlib and Hatay where 700,000 Syrians live in around 400 camps.”