U.S. close to a safe zone pact
BEIRUT — Turkey and the United States appeared Wednesday to be edging closer to setting up a socalled safe zone in northeast Syria, saying they had agreed to form a joint operations center to coordinate and manage its establishment.
The vague announcement issued at the end of three days of Turkish-U.S. talks in Ankara also appeared to avert — for now— a possible new Turkish incursion into Syria.
Meanwhile, Syrian government forces captured two northwestern villages in an intensified offensive on the last rebelheld part of the country, inching closer to the town of Kfar Zeita, which has been held by insurgents since 2012, according to opposition activists and state media.
Turkish and U.S. officials issued a statement in which they said they will set up “as soon as possible” a joint operations center based in Turkey.
Turkey has been pressing to control — in coordination with the U.S. — a zone within Syria 1925 miles deep , running east of the Euphrates River all the way to the border with Iraq. It wants the region to be cleared of Syrian Kurdish forces and has threatened on numerous occasions to launch a new operation in Syria against Syrian Kurdish forces if a safe zone is not established.
Turkey sees the Syrian Kurdish fighters, who make up the majority of the Syrian Democratic Forces and are allied with the U.S., as terrorists aligned with a Kurdish insurgency within Turkey. American troops are stationed in northeast Syria, along with the Kurdish forces, and have fought the Islamic State together. The differing positions on the Kurdish fighters have become a major source of tension between NATO allies Turkey and the U.S.
The statement — issued by Turkey’s Defense Ministry in Turkish and by the U.S. Embassy in Turkey in English — said the sides also agreed on the rapid implementation of measures addressing Turkey’s security concerns in an apparent reference to Turkey’s unease over the presence of Syrian Kurdish fighters, although it did not say if the region would be cleared of the Kurdish fighters.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan hailed the decision to form a joint operations center as a first step toward the creation of the socalled safe zone.
“It was important that a step be taken east of the Euphrates (river) and this is being taken together with the U.S.,” Erdogan told reporters in Ankara. “With the creation of the operations center, the process will begin.”
In Syria, government forces first captured the village of Arbaeen overnight, then nearby Zakat early in the morning as part of their offensive on Idlib province, the last remaining major rebel stronghold in Syria.
Syrian troops have been attacking Idlib and a stretch of land around it controlled by insurgents since April 30. The threemonth campaign of air strikes and shelling has displaced some 400,000 people and left more than 2,000 others dead on both sides.