In the latest action by Turkey in the conflict, rebels backed by their forces managed on Sunday to secure an area stretching from Azaz to Jarablus.
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Turkey launched its operation in Syria, called Euphrates Shield, on 24 August, driving out ISIS from the border town of Jarablus.
On Saturday, Turkish tanks with Syrian rebels seized Al-Rai, a town that rebels lost to Islamic State in May, and spread east and west to several surrounding villages. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad wants to fully recapture divided Aleppo, Syria’s largest city before the war.
With Turkey’s rapid success in less than two weeks, his position looks stronger with territory in between the two Kurdish “cantons” of Afrin and Kobane now in the hands of Ankara-backed rebels.
The entire Turkish border is now free from so-called Islamic State.
Turkey is fighting a three-decade-old Kurdish insurgency in the southeast and fears that the YPG’s advances will embolden militants at home.
While the government in Damascus is condemning the Turkish incursion as a violation of Syrian sovereignty, on Sunday the Turkish Prime Minister said that Syrian territorial integrity is “essential” for Turkey, as Binali Yildirim vowed to continue military operation south of the border.
Speaking to reporters after a meeting with US President Barack Obama at the G20 gathering of world leaders in China, Erdogan said: “It is our wish that a terror corridor not be formed across our southern border”.
The Turkey-backed forces are now advancing toward each other from both towns, hoping to close off the last stretch of the Syrian border ruled by the extremists.
Government forces and their allies recaptured areas in southwestern Aleppo on Sunday from the rebels after heavy bombardments and repeated attempts to drive the insurgents back.
Meanwhile, it is to note Turkey describes Kurdish groups too as terrorists.
During the meeting, Erdogan pointed out that the Free Syrian Army units will be deployed to the territory of the liberated Syrian city, Trend reports.
The Turkish-backed advance denied Islamic State its main route to the outside world, through which it has moved fighters and weapons. SANA said they discussed Syria’s war and ways of fighting terrorism. “We have grave differences with the Russians in terms of both the parties we support but also the process that is required to bring about peace in Syria”. She said it was likely that as IS militants are pushed out of territory, they will increasingly target government and Kurdish areas.
There are still around 250,000 civilians living in the city’s rebel-held areas.
Washington found itself trapped between two key allies who are bitter foes – North Atlantic Treaty Organisation partner Turkey, and the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia, also taking part in the war against the Islamic State jihadist group but considered a “terrorist” group by Ankara.
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It would oblige Russian Federation to prevent government warplanes from bombing areas held by the mainstream opposition, and would require the withdrawal of Damascus’s forces from a supply route north of Aleppo, the letter dated September 3 said.
