Turkey shells pro-Syrian regime fighters

Turkish-backed Syrian rebel fighters are seen in the town of Salwah, less than 10 kilometres from the Syria-Turkey border, ahead of firing towards Kurdish forces from the People's Protection Units (YPG) in the Afrin region, on February 19, 2018. (AFP)

ANKARA: Turkey fired shells at forces fighting in support of the Syrian regime on Tuesday in a major escalation in the battle for the Kurdish-controlled region of Afrin.
Hundreds of pro-regime fighters arrived in the afternoon to halt a Turkish-led offensive on the region against Syrian Kurdish militants.
A spokesman for the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), Nuri Mahmud, said Kurdish forces had called on the Damascus government to help fend off Turkey’s assault, AFP reported.
“Turkish regime forces targeted the locations of popular forces with artillery fire as they arrived at the Afrin region,” Syrian state news agency SANA reported.
Turkey said they it fired “warning shots” at Syria pro-regime forces in Afrin.
“Pro-regime terrorist groups that are trying to advance toward Afrin retreated to about 10 km from the town because of the warning shots,” Turkish state news agency Anadolu said.
The clash came hours after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey was preparing to lay siege to Afrin city center.
Turkey says the YPG is linked to the Kurdistan Workers’ Party PKK, which has waged a decades-long insurgency against the Turkish state. It launched Operation Olive Branch last month vowing to remove terrorist threats from its entire border with Syria. Turkey considers the Kurdish militias as much a threat as Daesh and other groups.
“Operation Olive Branch will continue with determination and achieve its aim, no matter what they do,” presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin tweeted.
In the meantime, Turkey is trying to consolidate its regional partnerships in order to maintain the fragile balance of alliances on the increasingly complicated Syrian battlefield.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Tuesday statement that the situation in Afrin could be resolved through direct dialogue between Ankara and Damascus.
Erdogan will meet in April with his Russian and Iranian counterparts; while the foreign ministers of the three countries are set to meet in Kazakhstan in two weeks for preparations ahead of a Syria summit in Istanbul.
Erdogan spoke with Vladimir Putin on the phone on Monday to voice Ankara’s determination in the Afrin offensive.
“If Syria opts for such a move, there will be consequences,” Erdogan reportedly told his Russian counterpart.
Oytun Orhan, a Syria analyst from Ankara-based think-tank ORSAM, said initially the YPG was expected to leave Afrin city with all its military and civil components and transfer all its light and heavy weapons.
According to details of the deal leaked to Turkish media on Tuesday, a ban on weapons would be imposed on the YPG and citizens, while all local management will be taken over by the Assad regime.
“Such a deal would benefit both Turkey and Russia. However, the situation seems different on the ground for the moment,” he told Arab News.
“It seems that currently Iranian-supported militia and the Syrian regime are testing the sensitivities of the two other guarantor countries by trying to bolster the YPG against Turkey and the Free Syrian Army,” he said.
According to Orhan, this is unacceptable for Russia and Turkey as they are concerned about the rising influence and uncontrolled initiatives of Iran in the region, and they want to counterbalance it.
“Iran would not continue such a unilateral move without Russia’s approval. It is also interesting that all recent news about this deal is produced by pro-Iran media outlets, and they have not been officially confirmed yet,” he added.
Orhan thinks that progress in Turkey’s Afrin operation into Afrin city center would oblige the YPG to make a deal for laying down arms and integrating into the Syrian Arab Army. Such a siege will also cut all logistical assistance provided to the terror group.
“Such an outcome will eliminate the YPG threat for Turkey with minimum costs, without pushing the country into the risk of a city war,” he noted.
Timur Akhmetov, a researcher at the Russian International Affairs Council, said Russian diplomacy pursues two interrelated goals in negotiations over a possible deal.
“First of all, Russia is interested in consolidation of control over Afrin.
“Secondly, Russia would like to see any deal to consider Turkish presence,” he told Arab News.