Turkey’s leader vows to press Kurd offensive
Move highlights NATO allies’ rift in Syrian conflict
ISTANBUL — Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Monday vowed to keep up an offensive against U.S.-backed Kurdish militias in Syria, rejecting American calls for restraint and boasting of a deal with Russia to press ahead with the assault.
The defiant message from Erdogan set up a possible expansion of the latest flash point in Syria’s seven-year conflict and underscored the deepening rift between the NATO allies over the Kurdish militias.
Turkey sees the Syrian Kurdish fighters as linked to insurgents waging a battle for Kurdish autonomy at home. Washington, meanwhile, has turned to the Syrian Kurds as a proxy force against the Islamic State and a buffer against attempts by the extremists to reclaim territory.
Turkey on Saturday announced an air and ground offensive seeking to rout the Kurdish militia, known as the YPG, from Afrin, an enclave near the Turkish border. U.S. officials quickly called on Turkey to limit the scope and duration of the operation to avoid civilian casualties.
“We appreciate their right to defend themselves, but this is a tough situation where there are a lot of civilians mixed in,” Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told reporters while traveling from Paris.
“Turkey has legitimate concerns about terrorists crossing the border into Turkey and carrying out attacks,” he said, adding that the U.S. has asked Turkey to “just try to be precise, try to limit your operation, try to show some restraint.”
But Erdogan offered little hint of scaling back.
“We are determined. Afrin will be sorted out. We will take no step back,” he said at a meeting of business leaders in the capital, Ankara.
Without elaborating, he said that Turkey reached an agreement with Russia — whose forces back Syrian President Bashar Assad — over the operation.
For the United States, they have been essential to eradicating Islamic State militants from key areas of Syria.
“They have proven their effectiveness,” Defense Secretary Jim Mattis told reporters Sunday.
“It has cost them thousands of casualties,” he said. “But you have watched them with the coalition support shred (the) ISIS caliphate in Syria.”
On Monday, Syrian Kurdish officials said that at least 13 civilians and three Kurdish fighters had been killed since the operation started. Turkey also deployed allied Syrian rebels to help in the fight.