Turkey on Monday accused Russian Federation of an “obvious war crime” after missile attacks in northern Syria killed scores of people, and warned the YPG it would face the “harshest reaction” if it tried to capture a town near the Turkish border.
Advertisement
Russian Federation is not bombing hospitals in northern Syria, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Tuesday, calling such reports “unsubstantiated accusations”.
The UN said “intentionally directing attacks” at hospitals and medical units would constitute a war crime.
Turkey, alarmed by the Kurdish gains, has since Saturday bombarded Kurdish positions across the border in Syria.
After four days of bombing USA allies in Syria – the Kurdish YPG militia – the Turkish government is now requesting that the United States begin a ground invasion of Syria. The French medical charity said “clearly… either the [Syrian] government or Russia” was responsible for Monday’s attack on its hospital.
The MSF confirmed its hospital was hit, without assigning blame.
Russia’s actions were also condemned by White House national security advisor Susan Rice in the “strongest terms” saying that it was counterproductive to the commitments made last week by major powers in Munich to reduce hostilities in the embattled region to allow humanitarian aid to be delivered: however, the unsigned deal doesn’t go into effect until the end of this week.
In recent weeks Syrian government troops backed by Russian airstrikes have been advancing on Western-backed rebels and other insurgents, hoping to seal off rebel-held parts of Aleppo, formerly Syria’s largest city. Many Syrian sources have suggested that the bombing was carried out either by Russian troops or Syrian regime forces. In the short term, a Russian-backed Kurdish advance could cut supplies to the rebels that Turkey’s been backing for years, increasing the chance that Assad will recapture Aleppo and survive in power.
On February 16 in Damascus, UN envoy Staffan de Mistura met Syrian Foreign Minister Walid al-Muallem to try to keep alive a proposal by world powers for a truce.
Turkish artillery has struck Syrian Kurdish targets since the weekend. “We are discussing this with allies”, the official told reporters at a briefing in Istanbul.
“There is effectively nothing we can do at the moment but they can be held to account in the future”, the Tory MP said.
The SDF fighters are a separate entity in Syria’s five-year civil war and have mostly battled the Islamic State group.
He said: “For us, in this situation, the primary source is the official announcement from the Syrian government”.
Sunni Arab Gulf states including Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE) said this month they were ready to send ground forces as part of an worldwide coalition against Islamic State, providing Washington takes the lead.
But Moscow has said it is targeting terrorist groups and dismissed any suggestion it has killed civilians since beginning its air campaign in support of President Bashar al-Assad’s forces in September.
Advertisement
Syria’s state news agency and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said government forces took the villages of Ahras and Misqan in the northern province of Aleppo.
