Describing the offensive as a new stage in Turkey’s efforts to create a 30-km deep security zone in the Syria, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Wednesday they’ll step up efforts to clear northeastern Syria’s Tal Rifaat and Manbij provinces of the YPG terrorists with a new anti-terror operation.
Ankara considers YPG Kurdish militias an extension of the militant Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) which is engaged in a decades-long conflict with Turkey.
PKK was initially established as a separatist movement seeking independence for Kurds but later shifted its focus towards broader autonomy for Kurds within Turkey.
The announced targets are a bit surprising considering the fact that the former is largely under the control of Russian military presence and the latter by the American troops though Erdogan also accused Moscow and Washington of failing to fulfill their commitments and enforce the Kurdish militias’ withdrawal from the Syrian regions bordering Turkey.
The Turkish president spoke about the new operation during a meeting of his Justice and Development (AK) Party in Ankara, not specifying, however, the start date of the operation or the number of troops expected to take part in it.
He first announced the plans last week in order, as he explained, to protect the nation and eliminate what it considers a terrorist threat to Turkey.
Turkey had already conducted four military operations in northeastern Syria, first against the presence of ISIL and then against the YPG, with the latest operation in late 2019 creating a safe zone between Tal Abyad and Ras al-Ayn as a result of two memorandums of understanding with the US and Russia.
Ankara previously targeted Kurdish militias in the northern regions of Metina, Zap, and Avasin-Basyan in what it called Operation Claw-Lock and also conducted several military operations against the Kurds in northern Syria in 2016 and 2018.
In addition to supporting militants in Idlib, it currently controls portions of the Aleppo, Raqqa, and Hasakah governorates in Syria.
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