RAS AL-AIN: Turkey has launched a broad assault on Kurdish-controlled areas in northeastern Syria, with intensive bombardment followed by a ground offensive made possible by the withdrawal of US troops.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced Wednesday the start of the attack on Twitter and soon after jets and artillery targeted Kurdish positions along the full width of the border, sending thousands of civilians fleeing their homes.
That was followed late in the evening by the beginning of a ground operation, the Turkish defence ministry said.
US President Donald Trump warned that if the Turkish operation was not conducted “in as humane a way as possible”, he would “wipe out” the country’s economy”.
The assault had seemed inevitable since he announced on Sunday a military pullback from the border, but the attack triggered international condemnation and an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council was set for Thursday.
The Arab League said it was convening an emergency meeting in Cairo on October 12.
The British-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said 16 members of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) militia were killed in the early hours of the Turkish offensive.
Both the SOHR and SDF reported heavy clashes near the city of Tel Abad.
Turkey’s defence ministry said on Twitter that its forces had struck 181 Kurdish “terror group” targets so far.
The spokesman for one of the pro-Turkish Syrian militant groups told AFP the land phase of the operation began in Tal Abad, and Turkish media reported special forces and armoured vehicles had entered at several points along the border.
‘Operation Peace Spring’
The US withdrawal smashed its alliance with the Kurdish forces who spearheaded five years of ground battles against Daesh in Syria.
Defending his decision, Trump said the Kurds did not “help us in Normandy”.
NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg urged Turkey to show “restraint” in its operation against Kurdish forces in Syria, warning that the fight against Daesh should not be put at risk.
The SDF called on the international community to impose a no-fly zone to protect against “an imminent humanitarian crisis”.
Erdogan, who dubbed the attack “Operation Peace Spring”, says the offensive is necessary to curb the power of the SDF due to its ties with Kurdish insurgents inside Turkey.
He also wants a “safe zone” on the Syrian side of the border where Turkey could send back some of the 3.6 million refugees it hosts from the eight-year civil war.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said “the Turks have a legitimate security concern”.
“They have a terrorist threat to their south,” he told PBS.
