TURKEY

thelivyjr
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Re: TURKEY

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MARKETWATCH

"Syrian military says it’s entered Kurdish-held northern city Manbij"


By Associated Press

Published: Dec 28, 2018 3:38 p.m. ET

BEIRUT (AP) — Syria’s military said Friday it had entered the key Kurdish-held town of Manbij in an apparent deal with the Kurds, who are looking for new allies and protection against a threatened Turkish offensive as U.S. troops prepare to leave Syria.

Turkey and American troops patrolling the town denied there was any change of forces in the contested area, contradicting the Syrians and highlighting the potential for chaos in the wake of last week’s surprise pronouncement by the United States that it was withdrawing its troops.


Since the U.S. announcement, forces have been building up around Manbij and further east, ushering in new alliances and raising the chances for friction.

The Kurds’ invitation to Syrian troops shows they’d rather let Syria’s Russian- and Iranian-backed government fill the void left by the Americans than face the prospect of being overwhelmed by their top rival Turkey.

Meanwhile, a flurry of meetings is expected in the coming days as all sides of the conflict scramble to find ways to replace the departing U.S. troops.

They include one Saturday in Moscow, where Russia will host top Turkish officials in a possible sign that the two sides could be working on a deal to avert a Turkish offensive into Syria.

Russians officials have said they expect Syrian government troops to replace the U.S. troops when they withdraw.

Turkey considers the U.S.-backed Kurdish People’s Protection Units, which now controls nearly 30 percent of Syria, a terrorist group linked to an insurgency within its own borders.

Kurdish-controlled Manbij has been at the center of rising tension between the U.S. and Turkey.


There were conflicting reports Friday on the location of the Syrian troops, who said they had moved into Manbij and raised the Syrian flag in the town.

The Kurdish militia said it has invited the Syrian government to take control of Manbij to protect it against “a Turkish invasion.”

But a Kurdish official said the government deployment has so far been limited to the front line with Turkey-backed fighters, based north and west Manbij.

And U.S. officials in Washington said Syrian regime forces and some Russian forces had moved a bit closer to the city and were largely south or southwest of the city.

The officials spoke anonymously because they were not authorized to discuss the troop movements publicly.

The U.S.-led coalition said the announcement that government troops had entered the town was “incorrect,” and called “on everyone to respect the integrity of Manbij and the safety of its citizens.”

Russia and Iran, meanwhile, welcomed the Syrian announcement.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov called it a “positive step” that could help stabilize the area.

Iran hailed it as a “major step toward establishing the government’s authority” over all of Syria.

Russia has signaled it expects the Syrian government to deploy where U.S. forces leave.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said the Syrian government move was “a psychological act,” and the situation in Manbij was uncertain.

He spoke as Turkey-allied forces in Syria said they were fortifying their front line positions ahead of the possible military offensive.

But Erdogan also noted that his country’s goal is to oust the Kurdish militia from along his country’s borders.

“If terror organizations leave, then there is no work left for us anyway,” Erdogan told reporters.

In Washington, Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who broke with U.S. President Donald Trump on his decision to withdraw U.S. troops from Syria, tweeted that reports about the Kurds aligning with Assad were a “major disaster in the making.”

Graham, a leading GOP voice on foreign policy and national-security issues in Congress, warned the development would be a “nightmare for Turkey and eventually Israel.”


Graham tweeted that the “big winners” are Russia, Iran, Assad and Islamic State militants.

National-security adviser John Bolton is expected in Turkey in the new year.

Friday’s announcement by the Syrian military comes as Turkey and allied Syrian fighters have been sending in reinforcement to the front lines and threatening an offensive to dislodge the Kurdish forces.

In response, the U.S. first warned against unilateral action and increased patrols and observation points in northeastern Syria.

Then, in a surprise move, Trump announced he was withdrawing troops from eastern Syria.

He later said the withdrawal would be coordinated with Turkey.

The decision left U.S.’s Syrian Kurdish partners in a conundrum.

With no backing from the U.S., the Kurdish forces looked to new allies to protect their Kurdish-administered areas.

Partners since 2014, the U.S-led forces and the Kurdish group have liberated most of east Syria from Islamic State militants.

Ilham Ahmed, a senior Kurdish official, said an agreement is being worked out between the Russians and the Syrian government.

She said the U.S. troops have not yet withdrawn from Manbij, but said Syrian troops would take over once U.S. withdrawal is complete.

“The aim is to ward off a Turkish offensive,” Ahmed said.

“If the Turks’ excuse is the (Kurdish militia), they will leave their posts to the government.”

The Syrian government has said it welcomes the Kurdish group returning to areas under its authority.

But government officials have stated they will not accept an autonomous area, a main demand for the Kurds.

The Syrian military declaration came shortly after the Kurds invited the government to seize control of Manbij to prevent a Turkish attack.

Pro-state Syrian al-Ikhbariya TV aired footage from inside Manbij of commercial streets on a rainy day, but didn’t show any troops.

It carried images of a military convoy driving late at night, purportedly to Manbij.

A timetable for the U.S. withdrawal has not yet been made public.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/syria ... ewer_click
thelivyjr
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Re: TURKEY

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NBC NEWS

"Turkey's Erdogan criticizes John Bolton as rift between NATO allies deepens - The national security adviser was accused of making a 'serious mistake' in calling for a new condition for the U.S. exit from Syria."


By Carol E. Lee

Jan. 8, 2019, 6:03 AM EST / Updated Jan. 8, 2019, 7:05 AM EST

ANKARA, Turkey — President Donald Trump’s plans for withdrawing U.S. troops from Syria were thrown into more uncertainty Tuesday as national security adviser John Bolton left the region after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan refused to meet with him.

Bolton’s mission to smooth a troop withdrawal with U.S. allies instead ended in only widening the rift with Turkey.


The path forward now appears more muddled than ever given Trump’s demand for assurances that Turkey protect Syrian Kurds after U.S. troops depart and Erdogan’s public snub of Bolton.

A senior administration official told NBC News that Trump thought he had gotten a commitment from Erdogan in a Dec. 23 phone call that Turkey would protect the Syrian Kurds, who have been a key U.S. ally in the fight against the Islamic State, after the American troops leave.

But a defiant Erdogan on Tuesday declined to meet with Bolton, who was in Turkey for talks about the withdrawal.

In a speech to his political party, Erdogan said that Bolton had made a "serious mistake" in saying no U.S. troops would leave northeast Syria without such a commitment.


Erdogan said that Turkey would never compromise on the issue of the Syrian Kurds, or YPG Kurdish militia, which Turkey sees as a terrorist organization and part of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party.

Bolton met for more than two hours earlier in the day with his Turkish counterpart, Ibrahim Kalin, the senior administration official, who was at the meeting, said.

During that meeting, Bolton presented Kalin with a list of five conditions the U.S. has for withdrawing troops from Syria — items agreed to by Bolton, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, acting Defense Secretary Pat Shanahan, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford and James Jeffrey, the U.S. envoy for Syria and the fight against ISIS, according to the senior administration official.

The list includes "a negotiated solution to Turkish security concerns,” the official said, and stipulates: "We want the protection of all civilians, particularly local minority populations."

"We’ll cooperate with Turkey on de-conflicting the airspace over northeast Syria."

"The United States opposes any mistreatment of opposition forces who fought with us against ISIS.”

Turkey rejected the proposal.

"I think it’s fair to say that the United States stuck by the president’s request as reflected in these points that the Kurds, that the opposition forces that fought with us, not be mistreated," the U.S. official said.

"And the Turks stuck by their position that the PYD and the YPG are terrorist groups and they’re free to go after them."

(The PYD, or Democratic Union Party, is the political wing of the YPG.)

Kalin told Bolton that Erdogan had committed Turkey to not taking offensive action in Syria while U.S. forces were there, the official said.

The official said Erdogan’s speech on Tuesday was not at odds with the commitment Trump thought he had gotten from Erdogan during their Dec. 23 phone call.

National Security Council spokesman Garrett Marquis said Erdogan called Kalin during their meeting and told him to send his regards to Bolton.

However, Erdogan said he wouldn’t be able to spend any time with Bolton because he was headed to Parliament to deliver a speech.

A meeting between Bolton and Erdogan was never confirmed, a U.S. official said, but administration officials had said one was expected.

Speaking before Erdogan's remarks to Parliament, Marquis said Bolton and Kalin had "a productive discussion" and had "identified further issues for dialogue."

Bolton’s comments about Turkey over the weekend during an interview with reporters traveling with him in Israel had drawn criticism from Turkish officials.

Trump orders withdrawal of U.S. troops from Syria

Trump announced Dec. 19 that all U.S. troops would immediately withdraw from Syria.

The announcement, which shocked U.S. allies and members of Trump’s own administration, stemmed from a phone call with Erdogan in which the Turkish leader convinced the president to withdraw and said Turkey would take over the fight against ISIS.

U.S. officials have since tempered the timeline for withdrawal, saying there isn’t one, and Trump has said a drawdown would happen slowly.

But Bolton’s comments Sunday to reporters in Israel marked the first time the U.S. put specific conditions on withdrawal and demanded an agreement from Turkey on the Kurds.

Erdogan said in his speech Tuesday that Turkey has completed preparations for a military operation in Syria.

Turkey boasts NATO's second-largest military.

Dunford, Jeffrey and Turkey’s deputy foreign and defense ministers also attended Tuesday’s meeting with Bolton and Kalın.

Dunford remained in Turkey after Bolton leaves to continue discussions with Turkish officials about a way forward in Syria.

Jeffrey plans to meet with the Syrian Kurds this week.

On Monday, Erdogan published an opinion article in The New York Times saying the Turkish government has “no argument with the Syrian Kurds.”

He called for a “stabilization force” in Syria that would be created by Turkey.

To do so, Turkey would vet the Syrian Kurds who fought with the U.S. against ISIS and include those “with no links to terrorist organizations in the new stabilization force,” Erdogan wrote.

“Only a diverse body can serve all Syrian citizens and bring law and order to various parts of the country,” he wrote.

'The walk-back to end all walk-backs': White House changes tune on Syria

Bolton told Kalin the op-ed was wrong and offensive, the senior administration official said.

It’s unclear if Erdogan was directly addressing remarks made by Bolton over the weekend when he wrote: “Turkey intends to cooperate and coordinate our actions with our friends and allies.”

While Bolton told reporters Sunday that a U.S. withdrawal will be contingent on whether the White House can reach an agreement with Turkey on protecting the Kurds, he also said the time American troops will remain in Syria is not unlimited — adding “the primary point is we are going to withdraw from northeastern Syria.”

The national security adviser’s repeated caveat that the withdrawal is from northeastern Syria, not Syria overall, underscores a policy shift since Trump’s Dec. 19 announcement that all American forces would leave Syria.

It’s a reflection of U.S. plans to keep some troops at Al Tanf in southern Syria as a deterrent to Iran even after those in the northern part of the country exit.

Carol E. Lee is a national political reporter for NBC News.

Reuters contributed.

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/turk ... s_20190108
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Re: TURKEY

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I THINK THIS BOLTON IS OFF HIS ROCKER …

THE DUDE SOUNDS LIKE A REAL LUNATIC …

IF HE WANTS TO INVADE IRAN, LET'S GIVE HIM A GUN AND SEND HIM THERE ...

THE NEW YORK TIMES

"Pentagon Officials Fear Bolton’s Actions Increase Risk of Clash With Iran"


By ERIC SCHMITT and MARK LANDLER

14 JANUARY 2019

WASHINGTON — Senior Pentagon officials are voicing deepening fears that President Trump’s hawkish national security adviser, John R. Bolton, could precipitate a conflict with Iran at a time when Mr. Trump is losing leverage in the Middle East by pulling out American troops.

At Mr. Bolton’s direction, the National Security Council asked the Pentagon last year to provide the White House with military options to strike Iran, Defense Department and senior American officials said on Sunday.

The request, which alarmed then-Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and other Pentagon officials, came after Iranian-backed militants fired three mortars or rockets into an empty lot on the grounds of the United States Embassy in Baghdad in September.

In response to Mr. Bolton’s request, which The Wall Street Journal first reported, the Pentagon offered some general options, including a cross-border airstrike on an Iranian military facility that would have been mostly symbolic.

But Mr. Mattis and other military leaders adamantly opposed retaliating, arguing that the attack was insignificant — a position that ultimately won out, these officials said.

Such a strike could have caused an armed conflict and could have prompted Iraq to order the United States to leave the country, said a senior American official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal policy deliberations.

Since Mr. Bolton took over from H.R. McMaster in April, he has intensified the administration’s policy of isolating and pressuring Iran — reflecting an animus against Iran’s leaders that dates back to his days as an official in the George W. Bush administration.

As a private citizen, he later called for military strikes on Iran, as well as regime change.

Mr. Bolton has made headway on some issues, like persuading Mr. Trump to withdraw from the Iran nuclear deal, but has had less success with others, like maintaining an American military presence in northeastern Syria to counter Iranian influence — something Mr. Bolton vowed to do only weeks before the president announced in December that he was pulling out.

In asking for military options, a senior administration official said, Mr. Bolton was merely doing his job as national security adviser.

He pointed out that the Iranian-backed militants also targeted the American Consulate in Basra.

“The N.S.C. coordinates policy and provides the president with options to anticipate and respond to a variety of threats,” said a spokesman for the National Security Council, Garrett Marquis.

Mr. Bolton, 70, is not the only Iran hawk in Mr. Trump’s circle of top advisers.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo declared in a speech at the American University in Cairo last week that “countries increasingly understand that we must confront the ayatollahs, not coddle them.”

Earlier this month, he warned Iran against launching three spacecraft, describing them as a pretext for testing missile technology that is necessary to carry a warhead to the United States and other nations.

His statement appeared aimed at building a legal case for diplomatic, military or covert action against the Iranian missile program.

It was surprising because Iran has used these modest space missions, mostly to deploy satellites, since 2005.

The senior American official said that the Pentagon and the intelligence agencies disagreed with Mr. Pompeo’s interpretation of the threat posed by the satellite launches.

Speaking on Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation” during a visit to Abu Dhabi, in the United Arab Emirates, Mr. Pompeo discounted the argument that Mr. Trump’s decision to withdraw 2,000 American troops from Syria in the coming months undercuts Washington’s ability to achieve its other goals in the region.

“That certainly includes in Syria,” he said.

“It certainly includes into Iran, if need be.”

But Mr. Pompeo also opposed the idea of an airstrike on Iran after its attack on the embassy, according to a former senior administration official.

On Sunday, he declined to comment about The Journal’s report.

On each stop of his Middle East trip, Mr. Pompeo, a former Army officer, has spoken of the need to counter Iran, but has not talked of military action.

When Mr. McMaster, then a three-star Army general, took over as national security adviser in early 2017, he ordered a new overall war plan for Iran.

Mr. Mattis, who is himself an Iran hawk from his days as a Marine Corps commander in the region, delivered options.

But those plans were not for the kind of pinpoint strikes that Mr. Bolton envisioned after the attack on the American Embassy on Sept. 6.

On the Sunday following the attack, the senior American official said, Mr. Bolton’s deputy at the time, Mira Ricardel, convened an emergency meeting of national security aides to Mr. Trump, called a deputies committee meeting, and asked for retaliatory options.

On Sept. 11, the White House said in a statement, “The United States will hold the regime in Tehran accountable for any attack that results in injury to our personnel or damage to United States government facilities."

"America will respond swiftly and decisively in defense of American lives.”

What happened next illustrates Mr. Bolton’s management style.

As the president’s national security adviser, he has largely eliminated the internal policy debates that could air high-level disagreements.

Mr. Bolton does not want to hear opposing views, these officials said, abhors leaks and wants to control everything that flows to the president.

But the result is that there is not much consideration of options and, more important, the risk of escalation, according to these people.


The Pentagon declined to comment on Mr. Bolton’s request for military options, saying in a statement, “The Department of Defense is a planning organization and provides the president military options for a variety of threats; routinely reviewing and updating plans and activities to deal with a host of threats, including those posed by Iran, to deter and, if necessary, to respond to aggression.”

A senior administration official said the United States would continue to pursue the withdrawal of Iranian-backed forces from Syria and a political solution in that country.

He said the United States was leaving a contingent of American troops at the Al Tanf base in south-central Syria, as a deterrent to Iranian movements in that region.

The past few days have been turbulent for Mr. Bolton.

He traveled to Turkey to present a list of conditions for the Syria withdrawal, including a pledge by the Turks not to attack America’s Kurdish allies in Syria.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan rejected that demand and refused to see Mr. Bolton.


On Sunday, Mr. Trump backed up his national security adviser, declaring on Twitter that the United States would “devastate Turkey economically if they hit Kurds.”

With Mr. Pompeo overseeing the nuclear negotiations with North Korea and taking a prominent role on China policy, Mr. Bolton has made Iran the heart of his focus as national security adviser.

He scored an early victory when Mr. Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal negotiated by his predecessor, Barack Obama.

Mr. McMaster, backed by Mr. Mattis and former Secretary of State Rex W. Tillerson, had talked Mr. Trump out of withdrawing from the deal on multiple occasions.

Even Mr. Pompeo tried to salvage the deal with the Europeans in the days before the president’s decision.

In March 2015, when Mr. Obama was negotiating the agreement, Mr. Bolton called for a military strike on Iran, writing in The New York Times that diplomacy would never prevent it from acquiring nuclear weapons.

“The inconvenient truth is that only military action like Israel’s 1981 attack on Saddam Hussein’s Osirak reactor in Iraq or its 2007 destruction of a Syrian reactor, designed and built by North Korea, can accomplish what is required,” Mr. Bolton wrote.

“Time is terribly short, but a strike can still succeed.”

Before he joined the Trump administration, Mr. Bolton advocated “the overthrow of the mullahs’ regime in Tehran.”

Once in office, he told Voice of America that leadership change was “not the objective of the administration.”


The news of Mr. Bolton’s effort to find a way to strike back at Iran comes as evidence is rising that Tehran is considering — or at least threatening — to leave the nuclear agreement.

The chief of Iran’s nuclear program, Ali Akbar Salehi, an M.I.T.-educated physicist who helped negotiate the deal, said on Sunday that Tehran had begun “preliminary activities for designing” a process for enrichment of uranium.

The actual enrichment — which he said would be at 20 percent purity, just short of being sufficient to build a nuclear weapon — would violate the accord.

Under its provisions, Iran could not enrich uranium at any significant quantities until 2030.

But the Iranian government has been under pressure to respond to Mr. Trump’s withdrawal and the reimposition of sanctions by the United States.

European powers have been urging Iran not to leave the deal, fearing it would give the United States an excuse for military action.

Mr. Salehi did not say what the “preliminary activities” were, or give a timetable for action.

But he said the country wanted to produce “modern fuel” for its Tehran Research Reactor, a small, aging reactor that was given to it, during the shah’s reign, by the United States.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/pen ... P17#page=2
thelivyjr
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Re: TURKEY

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BBC NEWS

"Turkey dismisses Trump threat to economy over Syrian Kurds"


14 January 2019

Turkey has dismissed President Donald Trump's threat to "devastate" its economy if it attacks Kurdish forces in Syria after a pullout of US troops.

"You cannot get anywhere by threatening Turkey economically," Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said.


US forces and the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) have fought in northern Syria against Islamic State.

Turkey regards the YPG as terrorists.

Mr Trump and Turkey's president again discussed Syria on Monday.

In a phone call, Mr Trump and Recep Tayyip Erdogan spoke about the need to create a "security zone" in northern Syria, the Turkish presidency said.

President Trump stressed that Turkey should not "mistreat the Kurds and other Syrian Democratic Forces with whom we have fought to defeat" IS, the White House said.

Mr Trump also "expressed the desire to work together to address Turkey's security concerns" in north-eastern Syria.

In December, the US president announced that Washington would pull out all troops from Syria because the Islamic State militant group had been "defeated".

The sudden move shocked allies and led to criticism. Several senior US military officials resigned shortly afterwards.

There were also fears that Kurds in the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which had partnered with the US, would be attacked by Turkey once the US withdrew.


What was Mr Trump's threat?

Mr Trump tweeted on Sunday that the withdrawal from Syria had begun, and that the US would "devastate Turkey economically if they hit the Kurds".

He also said any remaining IS fighters could be attacked from the air, and that a 20-mile (32km) "safe zone" could be established.

His tweet could be seen as a response to criticism that his decision to withdraw troops will hurt the US's regional allies.

Mr Trump offered no specifics on how the US could hurt Turkey's economy, and his announcement appeared to catch his advisers by surprise.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, who is currently touring the Middle East, responded to questions about Mr Trump's threat with: "You'll have to ask the president..."

"We have applied economic sanctions in many places, I assume he is speaking about those kinds of things."

Meanwhile, Turkey's foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu described Mr Trump's tweet as a "domestic policy message" to critics.

Can the US actually hurt Turkey's economy?

Mr Cavusoglu has rejected Mr Trump's threats, saying: "We have said multiple times that we will not fear or be deterred by any threat."

He also criticised Mr Trump's methods, saying: "Strategic alliances should not be discussed over Twitter or social media."

However, US sanctions have had an impact on Turkey's economy before.

The Trump administration imposed sanctions and trade tariffs in August, amid a row over a detained US pastor - contributing to a sharp drop in the value of the Turkish lira.

Pastor Andrew Brunson was released in October.

Meanwhile, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, said Turkey expected the US to "honour our strategic partnership".

"Terrorists can't be your partners and allies," he said.

Will they strike a deal to protect Kurdish fighters in Syria?

Over the weekend, before Mr Trump's latest tweets, Mr Pompeo said he had spoken to Mr Cavusoglu by phone and was "optimistic" that an agreement could be reached with Turkey to protect Kurdish fighters.

Mr Pompeo said the US recognised "the Turkish people's right and Mr Erdogan's right to defend their country from terrorists".

"We also know that those fighting alongside us for all this time deserve to be protected as well," he added.

Mr Erdogan has spoken angrily about American support for the Kurdish YPG militia, and vowed to crush it.

Mr Cavusoglu said Turkey was "not against" the idea of a secure zone - but was targeting "a terrorist organisation trying to divide Syria".


How is Mike Pompeo's Middle East tour going?

Mr Pompeo is now in Riyadh, where he discussed Iran and the conflicts in Yemen and Syria with the Saudi leadership.

He said he also raised human rights issues, including the detention of women's rights activists, and the murder of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi in the Saudi consulate in Turkey.

Mr Pompeo said King Salman and Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman had both "reiterated their commitment" to holding the killers of Mr Khashoggi accountable.

Prosecutors say Mr Khashoggi, a US-based critic of the Saudi government, was murdered in a "rogue" operation in Istanbul, by agents sent to persuade him to return to the kingdom.

However, many in the West have accused the crown prince of ordering the killing - something he has denied.

How many US troops are in Syria?

About 2,000 US military personnel are reported to be deployed in northern Syria.

Ground troops first arrived in autumn 2015 when then-President Barack Obama sent in a small number of special forces to train and advise YPG fighters.


The US did this after several attempts at training and arming Syrian Arab rebel groups to battle IS militants descended into chaos.

Over the intervening years, the number of US troops in Syria has increased, and a network of bases and airfields has been established in an arc across the north-eastern part of the country.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-46860902
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Re: TURKEY

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TIME

"A Top U.N. Judge Has Resigned Over 'Shocking' Interference From the White House and Turkey"


Casey Quackenbush

29 JANUARY 2019

A top judge in one of the United Nations’ international courts in The Hague has quit over what he termed “shocking” political interference from the White House and Turkey, the Guardian reports.

The judge, Christoph Flügge, alleged that Turkey used its veto to end the tenure of a Turkish judge in one of the U.N. courts, setting a dangerous precedent for intervention.

“Every incident in which judicial independence is breached is one too many,” he said.

“Now there is this case, and everyone can invoke it in the future."

"Everyone can say: ‘But you let Turkey get its way.’"

"This is an original sin.”

Turkish judge Aydın Sefa Akay was removed over alleged connections to a Turkish cleric living in the U.S. named Fethullah Gülen who Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan blames for a failed coup against him in 2016.

Flügge cited White House interference as well.

He said the U.S. had threatened judges over an International Criminal Court (ICC) investigation into the conduct of American soldiers in Afghanistan.


“John Bolton, the national security adviser to the US president, held a speech last September in which he wished death on the international criminal court,”Flügge said, according to the Guardian.

“If these judges ever interfere in the domestic concerns of the U.S. or investigate an American citizen, he said the American government would do all it could to ensure that these judges would no longer be allowed to travel to the United States – and that they would perhaps even be criminally prosecuted.”

Flügge said the court was stunned by Bolton’s hostility.

“The American threats against international judges clearly show the new political climate."

"It is shocking."

"I had never heard such a threat,” he said.

“It is consistent with the new American line: ‘We are No 1 and we stand above the law,’” he added.


http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/a-t ... id=HPDHP17
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Re: TURKEY

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THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

"U.S. set to pull troops from Syria by end of April, but no plan yet to protect Kurds"


By Dion Nissenbaum and Nancy A. Youssef

Published: Feb 7, 2019 4:51 p.m. ET

WASHINGTON — The U.S. military is preparing to pull all American forces out of Syria by the end of April, even though the Trump administration has yet to come up with a plan to protect its Kurdish partners from attack when they leave, current and former U.S. officials said.

With U.S.-backed fighters poised to seize the final Syrian sanctuaries held by Islamic State in the coming days, the U.S. military is turning its attention toward a withdrawal of American forces in the coming weeks, these officials said on Thursday.

Unless the Trump administration alters course, the military plans to pull a significant portion of its forces out by mid-March, with a full withdrawal coming by the end of April, they said.

The military-planning process comes as the Trump administration is struggling to come up with an agreement to protect Kurdish allies from being attacked by Turkish forces when the U.S. leaves.

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/us-se ... ewer_click
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Re: TURKEY

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NPR

"Turkey Joins With Iran To Launch Military Operation Along Border"


Bill Chappell

March 18, 2019·2:59 PM ET

Turkey and Iran launched a joint military operation against Kurdish militants along the the mutual border between the two countries on Monday, according to an announcement from the Turkish interior minister.

Turkey says the two unlikely allies — one a NATO member, the other a target of U.S. sanctions — have joined forces to target a common enemy: the Kurdistan Worker's Party or PKK, which the U.S., Turkey and others consider to be a terrorist group.


"We will announce the outcome of the operation later."

"We will eliminate [the terrorist PKK]," Turkish Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said as he announced the operation, according to the state-run Anadolu Agency.

Turkey has long fought the PKK; in recent years, it has also accused the U.S. of backing the group's allies in Syria by supporting Kurdish rebels near the Turkish border.

The PKK "wants to form an independent state in Turkey's southeast," Durrie Bouscaren reports from Istanbul for NPR's Newscast unit.

"The Turkish military regularly attacks PKK encampments in northern Iraq," Bouscaren says, "but Turkey's decision to pursue an operation with Iran appears to be a first."

"The two share part of Turkey's mountainous eastern border."

Discussing the political situation in Turkey, Bouscaren says that with local elections slated for the end of this month, Turkish politicians have increased their verbal attacks on the PKK.

In Iran, news about a joint operation with Turkey has been mixed.

State-operated IRNA published a report about the Turkish minister's announcement, including what looks to be confirmation from Iran's deputy interior minister.

But the same agency also separately reported that an anonymous source within Iran's military insisted that Iranian forces did not play any role in Turkey's military operation against the PKK on Monday.

https://www.npr.org/2019/03/18/70449157 ... ong-border
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Re: TURKEY

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ALJAZEERA

"Separate attacks kill nearly 50 Syrian soldiers - In one attack, ISIL ambushed Syrian forces in the desert of central Homs province, setting off two days of clashes."


20 APRIL 2019

Syrian government forces came under separate attacks from ISIL and al-Qaeda-linked rebels in different parts of the country that killed nearly 50 soldiers and allied fighters.

In one attack, Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) fighters ambushed Syrian forces in the desert of central Homs province on Thursday night, setting off two days of clashes that killed 27 soldiers, including four officers, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said on Saturday.

A pro-government militia, known as Liwa al-Quds, confirmed the ambush saying it had sent its fighters to liberate the two besieged battalions, made up of nearly 500 soldiers, east of the town of al-Sukhna.

In a Facebook post, the militia said it successfully broke the siege and liberated the surviving soldiers before pulling the bodies of those killed and damaged vehicles to safety.

Liwa al-Quds, one of the elite militias operating side by side with government troops, didn't give a casualty figure.

It said the besieged battalions were out in the desert looking for an army division that disappeared in the area over the last few days.

Sleeper cells

ISIL lost its last territories in Syria in March after months of battles with US-backed Kurdish-led fighters in the eastern province of Deir Az Zor.

But fighters remain active in the desert to the west of Deir Az Zor where they have taken refuge and increasingly targeted government troops and allied militia.

The armed group, which once controlled large swaths of territory in Syria and Iraq, has kept a network of sleeper cells active in both countries.

It has also kept up its media operations.

The ISIL-affiliated Aamaq website reported the attack east of al-Sukhna, saying in 24 hours of clashes its fighters killed nearly two dozen Syrian soldiers and officers.

It said they also seized Syrian government ammunition and vehicles.

Separately, government forces came under an attack from fighters of al-Qaeda-linked Hay'et Tahir al-Sham in northwest Syria, where a ceasefire is supposed to be in place.

The Observatory said the rebels assaulted government positions west of Aleppo early on Saturday, killing 21 soldiers and allied fighters.


Baladi news, an activist-operated news site, said the attack in Akrab village killed 27 soldiers, quoting an HTS operative.

Akrab overlooks the Aleppo-Damascus highway.

A ceasefire was reached in the area in September but is increasingly tested.

The area includes the last major stronghold of the armed opposition.

The ceasefire was negotiated by Russia and Turkey, who support opposite sides of the conflict but have closely coordinated their policies.

SOURCE: AP news agency

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/04/ ... 29713.html
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Re: TURKEY

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BBC

"Syrian civil war: 'Three killed' in attack on Turkish convoy"


19 AUGUST 2019

A Syrian government air strike aiming to stop a Turkish convoy reaching a rebel-held town in northern Syria has killed three civilians, Turkey alleges.

Another 12 people were injured in the attack in Idlib province on Monday, the Turkish defence ministry said.


Idlib, one of the few areas not under government control, was supposed to be protected by a buffer zone agreed with rebel-backing Turkey last year.

But government assaults have been on the increase since April.

Hundreds of civilians have already been killed as a result, and there are fears many more will die if the situation continues to escalate.

"This is our worst nightmare coming true," Jan Egeland, from the Norwegian Refugee Council (NRC), told the BBC.

"We have for years now warned against the ultimate catastrophe being Idlib, where there was no escape for three million civilians."

"There are some very bad militants inside."

"But a wholesale attack on this area of Idlib and adjacent northern Hama would mean that a million children would come in horrific crossfire, and it's that that now seems to be happening."

Why is Turkey sending a convoy into Syria?

Turkey, which backs some, but not all, the rebels, has forces in Idlib as part of last year's agreement with Russia.

According to Naji Mustafa, a spokesman for the National Liberation Front rebel grouping, the convoy was heading to one of its observation points with "reinforcements" when the attack took place.

An AFP correspondent who saw the convoy reported it included about 50 armoured vehicles, at least five of which were tanks.

But Syria has said the convoy's arrival in the region is an act of aggression.

It said the munitions would not stop government forces "hunting the remnants of terrorists".

According to the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR), a Russian aircraft carried out strikes near the convoy on 19 August.

Turkey has said the attack breaches last year's agreement, with the incident raising fears of direct clashes between the countries.

Why is this happening now?

After eight years of war, the Syrian government is trying to win back control of the last rebel-held areas.

Government forces, backed by Russia, reportedly entered the northwest outskirts of Khan Sheikhoun on Sunday.

Khan Sheikhoun, which was hit by a Sarin gas attack in 2017, lies on a highway connecting Damascus to Aleppo and is a strategically important town in the south of the province.

If it is captured, it will mean the Syrian regime has effectively encircled a rebel-held area to the south, which includes a Turkish observation post in the town of Morek.

Mr Mustafa told AFP the convoy was heading to Morek.

Syrian forces have now massed to both the east and west of Khan Sheikhoun, and air strikes are targeting the centre and surrounding villages.

Last week a Syrian government war plane was shot down in the area, hit by an anti-aircraft missile fired by militants, according to Syrian state news agency Sana.

Jihadist group Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) has claimed responsibility and released footage purportedly showing the captured pilot.

A colonel from a rebel faction confirmed to Reuters news agency that there were battles going on on the outskirts.

Fighters from a Turkish-backed rebel force have joined the defence, he said.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-49394759
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Re: TURKEY

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THE NEW YORK TIMES

"Militia Commander Says It Will Attack Turkish Forces if They Enter Syria"


Ben Hubbard, Carlotta Gall and Eric Schmitt

9 OCTOBER 2019

BEIRUT, Lebanon — The commander of the American-backed militia in Syria said Tuesday that it would attack Turkish forces if they entered northeastern Syria, while Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, indicated that such an operation was imminent.

“We will resist,” Mazlum Kobani, commander of the Kurdish-led militia, said in an interview with The New York Times.

“We have been at war for seven years, so we can continue the war for seven more years.”

Mr. Erdogan, speaking to reporters on a flight to Serbia, said the operation might happen before the news could be printed.

Turkish troops were being bused to the Syrian border in preparation for an incursion, Turkish media reported.

And the Turkish Defense Ministry said on Twitter that preparations to enter Syria “had been completed.”

The escalating challenge came after President Trump agreed to let the Turkish operation go forward and to move American troops out of the way.

On Monday, American troops withdrew from posts near two Syrian towns near the border.


The threat of armed resistance from the militia, a force trained and armed by the United States, raises the risks for Turkey as it weighs sending troops into Syria, and for the United States, which could find itself on the sidelines of a new front in Syria’s war — this time between two of its allies.

There was still confusion among allies and American officials about the administration’s policy as set out in seemingly contradictory statements by Mr. Trump and administration officials, and American officials said Tuesday that some senior Pentagon officials had been blindsided by the decision to pull American forces back from the border.

The Kurdish-led militia, the Syrian Democratic Forces, or S.D.F., partnered with the United States to defeat the Islamic State in Syria.

Since then, the militia, with American backing, has retained control of a large swath of northeastern Syria.

Turkey considers the militia part of a Kurdish guerrilla movement that threatens Turkey, and Mr. Erdogan has demanded a 20-mile-deep buffer zone along the border that Turkey would control to keep back any Kurdish forces.

Speaking by telephone from Syria, Mr. Kobani said he had been frustrated by the White House’s announcement on Sunday that the United States would stand aside for a Turkish incursion, and that the lack of clear, predictable policies from Washington had made it hard to plan.

“There should not be any ambiguity,” he said.

He spoke of United States troops who had helped his forces fight the Islamic State as comrades-in-arms and said any rupture in that partnership could destabilize the region.

“We fought with U.S. forces to get rid of terrorism, and we are still in this continuing battle,” he said.

He called on Americans to “put pressure on their political and military leaders to stop the Turkish attack,” which he said would lead to “big massacres.”

Mr. Trump said Sunday that the United States would not block a Turkish advance.

But on Monday he said that he would “obliterate” Turkey’s economy if its military did anything “off limits,” without defining what that meant, and his aides insisted that he had not given a green light to an invasion.


On Tuesday, he said that he had invited Mr. Erdogan to visit the White House next month.

Two American officials, speaking on condition of anonymity to discuss private diplomatic and military conversations, said that given the apparently contradictory statements by Mr. Trump, the Turks seemed flummoxed about what support, if any, they might get from the United States.

As a result, they may be rethinking what to do next, the officials said.

Still, several American officials said they expected a Turkish incursion to begin Wednesday, even in the face of congressional blowback.

Senator Lindsey Graham, Republican of South Carolina, said in a tweet directed at Turkish officials that they “do NOT have a green light” to advance and that “there is massive bipartisan opposition in Congress, which you should see as a red line.”

Turkish news media reported that Turkey’s armed forces were preparing F16 jets and Howitzers.

Special forces troops were arriving in buses at the border crossing of Akcakale just across from the Syrian town of Tel Abyad, and cranes were moving into position to lift concrete barriers at the border.

Tel Abyad was one of two towns evacuated by American forces on Monday.

The other was Ras al Ain.

American officials said Tuesday that Turkey had amassed several hundred troops, including tanks and other armor, near the two towns.

Political analysts with knowledge of the plan worked out with American officials said Turkey planned to set up four bases or combat posts in a narrow area along the border, and had agreed to stick to a limited action as a first stage.

“I would expect Turkey to implement a graduated incursion, then go back to negotiation with the U.S. from a stronger position,” said Ozgur Unluhisarcikli, Ankara director of the German Marshall Fund of the United States.

“Then when it is in a better situation, do a second operation, and a third."

"That is a graduated strategy.”

Mr. Trump’s argument that pulling United States forces from Syria was a fulfillment of his vow to get Americans out of “endless wars” unleashed a wave of criticism, much of it from Republican lawmakers.

Many argued that withdrawing the roughly 1,000 United States troops in northeastern Syrian would open a void that could be exploited by President Bashar al-Assad of Syria or his Russian and Iranian allies, or by the Islamic State.

Mr. Trump has not ordered a full withdrawal from Syria.

The order on Sunday was only to relocate roughly 100 to 150 troops that had been stationed near the Turkish border.

About two dozen were pulled back on Monday.

But analysts feared that any redeployment of Kurdish troops to fight Turkey in the north would take them away from the battle against the Islamic State.

The Islamic State was driven from its last territory in Syria in February, but the S.D.F., with the support of American Special Operations Forces, continue to battle the group’s remnants.

The American officials said the S.D.F. was already beginning to move off some of its counterterrorism missions against the Islamic State.

“The danger of ISIS is real,” Mr. Kobani said, adding that it maintains sleeper cells throughout the territory.

His forces also oversee prisons and camps holding tens of thousands of former Islamic State fighters and their families, which Mr. Trump has said Turkey could take over.

Mr. Kobani said there had been no conversations with the United States about handing over these prisoners to Turkey and he called the idea “impossible.”

Mr. Kobani said that he would prefer that the United States remain in Syria until the Islamic State and its remnants are destroyed and the country reached a “complete political solution that guarantees everyone’s rights.”

The Pentagon on Tuesday challenged published accounts asserting that Mr. Trump’s decision to order American troops to pull back from the border surprised many Defense and State Department officials.

Defense Secretary Mark Esper and Gen. Mark Milley, the new chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, “were consulted over the last several days by the president regarding the situation and efforts to protect U.S. forces in northern Syria in the face of military action by Turkey,” said Jonathan Hoffman, a Pentagon spokesman.

Several Pentagon officials confirmed that there had been discussions about Mr. Erdogan’s threats to invade northern Syria, but said that they had no hint that Mr. Trump was going to order American troops to step aside and leave their Syrian Kurdish allies vulnerable to attack.

In fact, the officials said, both Mr. Esper and General Milley warned their Turkish counterparts last week that any such cross-border operation would seriously damage United States-Turkish relations.

American commanders had expected to have some advance notice before Turkey launched an operation in northern Syria, and said they would probably have pulled back American forces to avoid advancing Turkish troops.

But until Mr. Trump’s order on Sunday, there were no plans to pull back pre-emptively, the officials said.

In a tweet on Tuesday, Mr. Trump insisted that he was not betraying the Kurds.

“We may be in the process of leaving Syria, but in no way have we Abandoned the Kurds, who are special people and wonderful fighters,” he said.

He warned that “any unforced or unnecessary fighting by Turkey will be devastating to their economy and to their very fragile currency.”

Mr. Kobani says he would prefer to stick with the United States and work for a stable Syria, but that his forces are ready to attack if Turkey invaded.

“There will be lots of resistance if they cross the border,” he said.

“We will not accept them on our land in any way.”

Ben Hubbard reported from Beirut, Carlotta Gall from Istanbul, and Eric Schmitt from Washington. Reporting was contributed by Mustafa Ali and Hwaida Saad.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/mil ... P17#page=2
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