The Turkish government wants to stop Kurdish forces gaining control of an unbroken swathe of Syrian territory on Turkey’s frontier, which it fears could embolden the Kurdish militant group PKK, which has waged a three-decade insurgency in Turkey.
Advertisement
Two Turkish F-16 warplanes struck six Islamic (IS) targets and a position of YPG in Syria on August 27, Turkish security sources told Reuters.
Turkish air strikes and artillery attacks have killed at least 40 people, mostly civilians, and wounded dozens more in a single attack, according to a group monitoring the Syrian war and rebels.
The coalition-supported SDF Jarabulus Military Council said air strikes struck homes and killed civilians in the town, calling it “a risky escalation that threatens the fate of the region”.
Turkey first sent tanks across the border on Wednesday as part of a stated two-pronged operation against ISIL, also known as ISIS, and Kurdish-led forces.
Another 20 were killed and 25 wounded in air strikes near the town of Al-Amarneh, it said.
A spokesman for the local Kurdish administration said 75 people had been killed in both villages.
This news story is related to Latest/145959-Turkish-army-thrusts-deeper-into-Syria-monitors-say-35-villagers-killed/ – breaking news, latest news, pakistan ne.
The Observatory said the bombardment targeted an area south of Jarabulus, a former Isis stronghold, which Turkish-led forces captured on the first day of the offensive, code named “Euphrates Shield”.
A captain with the Turkish-backed Syrian rebels said the aim was to push the YPG back to the east bank of the Euphrates river, a position the United States has agreed they should occupy.
In a statement Saturday, Kurdish forces accused Ankara of seeking to “expand its occupation” inside Syria.
However, until the night of August 27, the targeting of Kurdish fighters in northern Syria had been limited to attacks by Turkish artillery, tanks, and infantry.
Ankara considers the YPG a “terrorist” group and has fiercely opposed its bid to expand into areas recaptured from ISIS to create a contiguous autonomous zone.
A Turkish soldier was killed by a Kurdish rocket attack late Saturday, the first such fatality in the offensive, now in its fifth day.
Its military intervention has further complicated a conflict that has killed more than 290,000 people and displaced more than half the country’s population since March 2011.
Meanwhile, the UNs special envoy to Syria, Staffan De Mistura, urged the opposition to approve plans to deliver aid to rebel-held eastern Aleppo and government-controlled western Aleppo through a regime-held route north of the city during a 48-hour humanitarian pause.
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said that his nation would continue its “operations against terrorist organisations” and repeated his pledge that he would approve reinstituting the death penalty if parliament backed it.
Advertisement
Russia, which backs Assad, has endorsed the proposal.
