Afrin urges Syria to intervene to stop Turkish planes overhead

Syria should intervene to stop Turkish warplanes flying over the northern district of Afrin, the local authority told AFP Thursday, the sixth day of Ankara's assault on the Kurdish-controlled enclave.

"If the Syrian state has a real position, with the capabilities it has, it should stand in the face of this aggression and say that it will not allow Turkish planes to fly in Syrian airspace," said Othman Al-Sheikh Issa.

Al-Sheikh Issa is the co-chair of Afrin's executive council.

Turkey launched an offensive against the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) on Saturday in their enclave of Afrin, supporting Syrian rebels with air strikes and ground troops.

Afrin is governed by a semi-autonomous administration dominated by Kurdish parties, and Syrian government troops have not had a presence there for several years.

"We consider Afrin an inseparable part of Syrian territory. Any attack on Afrin is an attack on all the region's people and on the sovereignty of the Syrian state," said Al-Sheikh Issa.

"This is why we called on the Syrian state to break its silence and demonstrate its position towards this ruthless aggression," he told AFP.

His comments came after the local authority in the Afrin district called on Syria's government to do more to protect its borders.

"We call on the Syrian state to do its sovereign duty towards Afrin and protect its borders with Turkey from the Turkish occupier's attacks... and deploy its armed forces to protect the borders," said the statement.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad on Sunday condemned Turkey's assault and last week Deputy Foreign Minister Faisal Mekdad warned government forces could shoot down Turkish warplanes.

US, Turkey discuss Syria safe zone: Pentagon
Washington (AFP) Jan 25, 2018 - US and Turkish military commanders have discussed the possibility of creating a "secure zone" along the border with Syria, a Pentagon spokesman said Thursday, amid rising tensions over Turkish intervention in the region.

"Clearly we continue to talk to the Turks about the possibility of a secure zone, whatever you want to call it," Lieutenant General Kenneth McKenzie told reporters.

"We've looked at that for a couple of years in various different iterations and no final decision on it yet. Our military commanders are still talking so I would say it's a concept that's out there ... it's simply an idea that's floating around right now."

McKenzie did not go into details about what a safe zone might entail, but Turkish media have said Secretary of State Rex Tillerson told his Turkish counterpart Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu that he supports creating a secure area that reaches 30 kilometers (18.5 miles) into Syria.

The brutal Syrian war, which has claimed more than 340,000 lives since 2011, has grown even more complex over the past week with Turkey launching a ground operation against Kurdish fighters in northern Afrin, close to the Turkish border.

That has heightened tensions with NATO member Turkey's Western allies -- particularly the United States, which has backed the Kurdish YPG in their fight against the Islamic State group.

"Particularly in Afrin, Turkish operations ... that have the effect of inducing friction into the equation, of making it harder to focus on why we are in Syria ... are a negative thing," McKenzie said, adding that he understood Turkey's "legitimate" security concerns.

The three-star general added that the Turkish operations in Afrin were "not helpful" in the fight against IS.

He would not comment on what the US military would do if the Turks move to the east and continue their push against the Kurds to the Kurdish-held city of Manbij.

If that happens, America would find itself at an extraordinary crossroads.

It would need to determine whether it would support its NATO ally Turkey, the Kurdish fighters it has backed to defeat IS, or somehow forge some sort of compromise between the two sides.

Pentagon funded Afghan units accused of rights abuses: report
Washington (AFP) Jan 23, 2018
The US military funded Afghan police and security units even though American officials knew members were implicated in gross human rights violations, according to a watchdog report released Tuesday. The previously secret report, first provided to Congress in June but now declassified, lays bare the cultural rifts that can exist when America works with local partners. According to the re ... read more

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