TURKEY’S BLITZ ON SYRIA
Warning that invasion may see captured Isis fighters escape amid new turmoil
TURKEY opened a Pandora’s box as it launched a military offensive in Syria yesterday – striking Kurdish fighters who helped defeat Isis.
Warplanes pounded suspected positions of Kurdish forces in Ras al Ayn – a northeastern town with residential areas close to the Turkish border – causing mass panic in the streets.
The invasion, which sparked widespread condemnation, had effectively been given a green light on Sunday when Donald Trump announced he was moving US troops back from the border area.
Last night the US President spoke to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson on the phone, with both leaders expressing ‘serious concern at Turkey’s invasion’ and ‘the risk of a humanitarian catastrophe in the region’, a Downing Street spokesman said.
It came as Turkey said its ground forces had crossed into northern Syria – forcing Kurdish soldiers to abandon their positions fighting the last pockets of Isis further south and form a ‘human shield’ on the border.
The Kurdish-led force known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) said several locations were hit – killing both fighters and civilians – and warned of a potential ‘humanitarian catastrophe’.
It pleaded with the remaining US-led coalition against Isis to establish a no-fly zone in the area to stop ‘attacks on innocent people’.
The Turkish military mission – dubbed Operation Peace Spring – is designed to establish a ‘safe zone’ across the border in territory controlled by Syria’s Kurdish minority. The SDF took the land after years of brutal conflict with Isis, whose fighters it has largely confined in prisons and camps. There are fears these fighters will now escape and regroup as the SDF is diverted to defend the border against the Turks. Sources at al-Hawl camp in the northeast last night told a Kurdish news agency that some Isis women had managed to escape after rioting and burning tents. Turkey’s hardline president Recep Tayyip Erdogan accuses the SDF of being terrorists and supporting the insurgency by their fellow ethnic Kurds in Turkey. He tweeted yesterday: ‘Our mission is to prevent
the creation of a terror corridor across our southern border, and to bring peace to the area.’
But the move sparked international condemnation – with even Mr Trump claiming he ‘does not endorse’ the offensive and calling the operation ‘a bad idea’. In the town of Tal Abyad, streams of families fled on roads as the first airstrikes hit.
Similar scenes played out in Ras al Ayn, while near the town of Qamishli plumes of smoke were seen rising from an area close to the border after activists reported sounds of explosions nearby.
Turkish media also reported that six rockets fired by the Kurds hit the Turkish town of Nusaybin on the border.
Hours before the attack, Kino Gabriel, a senior SDF official, told Sky News: ‘People are already working and moving towards the border area to create a human shield against any Turkish invasion and I think everyone is also working to prepare for a future operation.’
Turkey has long threatened to attack the Kurds and was effectively given the go-ahead by Mr Trump’s surprise announcement to retreat and ‘get out of these ridiculous Endless Wars’.
Turkey wants to send up to two million Syrian refugees to the so-called ‘safe zone’ it intends to create. There are fears such a move will lead to a resurgent Isis and would ignite fresh combat in Syria’s eight-year-old war.
President Bashar al-Assad’s Syrian regime, which is backed by Russia, is keen to recapture former Isis territories won by Kurdish fighters.
Overnight on Tuesday, Isis fighters took advantage of the chaos. Three suicide bombers struck an SDF position in Raqqa – the former capital of their so-called caliphate – in what the Kurdish-led force called ‘the initial repercussions of the Turkish attack’. There were no casualties.
Brett McGurk, Mr Trump’s former Isis envoy, tweeted yesterday: ‘The [President’s] green-lighting a Turkish attack into NE Syria opens Pandora’s box. Expect Russian backed forces to move as well. Total mess.’
France Britain and Germany called for a UN Security Council meeting to address Turkey’s offensive – and yesterday Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney issued a statement saying Turkey’s actions are ‘deeply troubling’ and ‘cannot be condoned’. He said teh miltary action ‘risks undermining’ the ‘decisive progress’ made in the ‘fight against Isis’ earlier this year.