MARKETWATCH
"Draghi puts heat on politicians to boost fiscal stimulus with his ECB swan song"
By William Watts
Published: Sept 12, 2019 2:28 p.m. ET
Once again, Mario Draghi did “whatever it takes” on monetary policy, overcoming opposition from fellow European Central Bank policy makers Thursday to deliver a sweeping package of seemingly open-ended stimulus in a bid to shore up a flagging eurozone economy and push up stubbornly low inflation.
But he also offered a sobering message on the limits of the ECB’s efforts.
Draghi, chairing his penultimate meeting before leaving the ECB presidency at the end of October, was more explicit than ever about the limited ability of monetary policy to cure the euro area’s longstanding economic ills.
In his news conference, Draghi said the ECB would have had to do less on the monetary policy front if fiscal policy had played a bigger role.
Moreover, he said it was “high time for fiscal policy” to take charge in shoring up the economy.
Draghi, at the height of the eurozone debt crisis in July 2012, uttered the three-word phrase that will forever be associated with his tenure when he pledged the ECB would do “whatever it takes” to preserve the euro.
Often overlooked, is that Draghi qualified the pledge with the words “within our mandate.”
Draghi has spent much of his term testing the limits of that mandate, which is focused solely on price stability as reflected in an annual inflation target of near but just below 2%.
Draghi gets a lot of sympathy from observers who note that the ECB had little choice but to pull out the stops on stimulus in the wake of the financial crisis and the eurozone’s debt woes.
The region’s elected politicians tended to dither, repeatedly kicking the proverbial can down the road when it came to bailouts while healthy economies, such as Germany, refused to contemplate fiscal stimulus.
Even now, with Germany seen in danger of slipping into recession, politicians in Berlin are offering little more than halfhearted indications they would be open to delivering stimulus, but only once the economy is already in contraction.
Several economists and analysts saw Thursday’s ECB package as part of Draghi’s effort to raise pressure on government officials to loosen the fiscal spigots.
“The central bank has long felt that monetary stimulus alone won’t be enough and by doubling down on a massive stimulus package, he’s put the ball in their court,” said Kathy Lien, managing director of FX strategy at BK Asset Management, in a note.
“With his bold curtain call, Draghi is taking the problem of low growth seriously and saying now its time for the governments to act.”
Lien argued that Draghi’s push for more fiscal stimulus was partly behind the euro’s bounceback from its initial post-announcement fall.
Claus Vistesen, chief eurozone economist at Pantheon Macroeconomics, said Draghi made clear that the ECB believes it’s being pushed to take increasingly extreme actions as fiscal policy makers sit idle.
But the message could end up being too sobering.
It raises dangers in that the more the ECB argues that its own stimulus measures are being rendered ineffective due to a lack of stimulus, the higher the risk that markets stop believing in what the central bank is doing, he said.
Vistesen argued that while Draghi was flirting with danger, fiscal policy makers are, in fact, likely to step up eventually and that the combination of loose monetary and fiscal policy in the next 12 months should be enough to give asset prices and growth a boost down the road.
Meanwhile, Christine Lagarde, the former French finance minister and International Monetary Fund managing director who is set to take the reins from Draghi on Nov. 1, appears in harmony with Draghi’s tune.
In comments before the European Parliament earlier this month, Lagarde said central banks “are not the only game in town,” the Financial Times reported, saying richer eurozone governments with low deficits should be ready to spend more during downturns.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/dragh ... 2019-09-12
THE EUROPEANS
Re: THE EUROPEANS
MARKETWATCH
"ECB cuts key rate, relaunches QE to shore up eurozone economy"
By William Watts
Published: Sept 12, 2019 12:58 p.m. ET
The European Central Bank delved deep into its tool box on Thursday, cutting its deposit interest rate further into negative territory, launching a new round of monthly bond purchases and taking other steps to stimulate a flagging eurozone economy.
In outgoing ECB President Mario Draghi’s next-to-last meeting, the central bank, as expected, delivered a 10 basis point cut to the deposit rate that banks pay to park excess reserves with it.
The move pushed the rate to minus 0.5%.
In a news conference following the decision, Draghi said stubbornly low inflation, which remains well below the ECB’s target of near but just below 2%, was the main driver for the decision.
Draghi said risks to the eurozone outlook had increased as a result of prolonged global trade disputes and concerns about the prolonged process involving the U.K. exit from the European Union.
Risks of a eurozone recession remained “small,” he said, but had increased since the ECB’s last meeting.
Economists had been less certain whether the ECB would also move to relaunch its quantitative easing program at its September meeting, but policy makers did so.
The ECB said it would begin buying 20 billion euros a month worth of securities beginning Nov. 1.
Doubts had emerged in the runup to the meeting after a handful of ECB officials, in public remarks and media interviews, had questioned the need for relaunching asset purchases.
Draghi, in a news conference following the decision, said there had been broad support for the rate cut and an extension of the central bank’s forward guidance on rates, but acknowledged more “diversity” of views on relaunching bond purchases.
Still, there was a broad consensus in favor of the entire package.
Moreover, economists were describing the ECB’s asset-buying plan as “open-ended” QE, with policy makers pledging to continue purchases “as long as necessary to reinforce the accommodative impact of its policy rates” and to end shortly before the ECB begins to raise key interest rates.
“Today’s decisions have anchored and enshrined the Draghi legacy in future ECB decisions."
"‘Whatever it takes’ has just been extended by ‘as long as it takes,’ said Carsten Brzeski, chief economist at ING Germany, referring to Draghi’s famous 2012 pronouncement at the height of the eurozone debt crisis that the ECB would do “whatever it takes” to preserve the euro.
Among other steps taken by the ECB on Thursday, policy makers extended the so-called forward guidance on rates, saying they would remain at “present or lower levels” until the inflation outlook “robustly” converges with the bank’s target inflation rate of near but just below 2%.
Previously, the ECB said it intended rates to remain at present or lower levels through the first half of next year.
The ECB also made adjustments to its targeted long-term refinancing operations to further encourage lending and, in a bid to ease pressure on bank profitability from a lower deposit rate, announced it would introduce a tiered system that would exempt a chunk of excess reserves parked by banks with the ECB from the negative rate.
The decision drew the attention of U.S. President Donald Trump, who has previously accused the ECB of working to undercut the dollar.
On Thursday, he used the decision as an excuse to again bash the U.S. Federal Reserve via Twitter:
Asked about the tweet, Draghi responded that ECB policy makers “do not target the exchange rate, period.”
The euro fell to a two-year low versus the U.S. dollar in the wake of the decision, but later rebounded following a round of U.S. economic data and after a news report said Trump administration officials were weighing an interim trade deal with China.
The pan-European Stoxx 600 index was up 0.2%.
U.S. stocks pushed higher, with the S&P 500 up 0.5%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose around 110 points, or 0.4%.
The bond-buying decision sent European bond yields sinking, dragging on U.S. Treasury yields.
But yields soon rebounded into positive territory as trade-deal hopes appeared to take center stage.
Yields and bond prices move in opposite directions.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/ecb-c ... 2019-09-12
"ECB cuts key rate, relaunches QE to shore up eurozone economy"
By William Watts
Published: Sept 12, 2019 12:58 p.m. ET
The European Central Bank delved deep into its tool box on Thursday, cutting its deposit interest rate further into negative territory, launching a new round of monthly bond purchases and taking other steps to stimulate a flagging eurozone economy.
In outgoing ECB President Mario Draghi’s next-to-last meeting, the central bank, as expected, delivered a 10 basis point cut to the deposit rate that banks pay to park excess reserves with it.
The move pushed the rate to minus 0.5%.
In a news conference following the decision, Draghi said stubbornly low inflation, which remains well below the ECB’s target of near but just below 2%, was the main driver for the decision.
Draghi said risks to the eurozone outlook had increased as a result of prolonged global trade disputes and concerns about the prolonged process involving the U.K. exit from the European Union.
Risks of a eurozone recession remained “small,” he said, but had increased since the ECB’s last meeting.
Economists had been less certain whether the ECB would also move to relaunch its quantitative easing program at its September meeting, but policy makers did so.
The ECB said it would begin buying 20 billion euros a month worth of securities beginning Nov. 1.
Doubts had emerged in the runup to the meeting after a handful of ECB officials, in public remarks and media interviews, had questioned the need for relaunching asset purchases.
Draghi, in a news conference following the decision, said there had been broad support for the rate cut and an extension of the central bank’s forward guidance on rates, but acknowledged more “diversity” of views on relaunching bond purchases.
Still, there was a broad consensus in favor of the entire package.
Moreover, economists were describing the ECB’s asset-buying plan as “open-ended” QE, with policy makers pledging to continue purchases “as long as necessary to reinforce the accommodative impact of its policy rates” and to end shortly before the ECB begins to raise key interest rates.
“Today’s decisions have anchored and enshrined the Draghi legacy in future ECB decisions."
"‘Whatever it takes’ has just been extended by ‘as long as it takes,’ said Carsten Brzeski, chief economist at ING Germany, referring to Draghi’s famous 2012 pronouncement at the height of the eurozone debt crisis that the ECB would do “whatever it takes” to preserve the euro.
Among other steps taken by the ECB on Thursday, policy makers extended the so-called forward guidance on rates, saying they would remain at “present or lower levels” until the inflation outlook “robustly” converges with the bank’s target inflation rate of near but just below 2%.
Previously, the ECB said it intended rates to remain at present or lower levels through the first half of next year.
The ECB also made adjustments to its targeted long-term refinancing operations to further encourage lending and, in a bid to ease pressure on bank profitability from a lower deposit rate, announced it would introduce a tiered system that would exempt a chunk of excess reserves parked by banks with the ECB from the negative rate.
The decision drew the attention of U.S. President Donald Trump, who has previously accused the ECB of working to undercut the dollar.
On Thursday, he used the decision as an excuse to again bash the U.S. Federal Reserve via Twitter:
Asked about the tweet, Draghi responded that ECB policy makers “do not target the exchange rate, period.”
The euro fell to a two-year low versus the U.S. dollar in the wake of the decision, but later rebounded following a round of U.S. economic data and after a news report said Trump administration officials were weighing an interim trade deal with China.
The pan-European Stoxx 600 index was up 0.2%.
U.S. stocks pushed higher, with the S&P 500 up 0.5%, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose around 110 points, or 0.4%.
The bond-buying decision sent European bond yields sinking, dragging on U.S. Treasury yields.
But yields soon rebounded into positive territory as trade-deal hopes appeared to take center stage.
Yields and bond prices move in opposite directions.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/ecb-c ... 2019-09-12
Re: THE EUROPEANS
MARKETWATCH
"Eurozone manufacturing PMI drops in September to worst level in nearly 7 years"
By Steve Goldstein
Published: Sept 23, 2019 9:38 a.m. ET
Manufacturing sentiment in the eurozone fell in September to the worst level in nearly seven years, new figures released Monday show.
The flash eurozone manufacturing purchasing managers index fell to an 83-month low of 45.6 in September, down from 47 in August.
Economists polled by FactSet expected a 47.3 reading, and any reading below 50 indicates worsening conditions.
German manufacturing PMI fell to 41.4 in September from 43.5, the worst reading in more than a decade.
The flash eurozone services PMI fell to an 8-month low of 52 from 53.5 in August, which was below the 53.2 reading expected by economists.
“The eurozone economy is close to stalling as a deepening manufacturing downturn shows further signs of spreading to the services sector,” said Chris Williamson, chief business economist at IHS Markit.
New orders for goods and services fell for the first time since January, dropping at the sharpest rate since June 2013.
The flash readings are based on 85% to 90% of typical responses.
The deterioration comes as the European Central Bank, which cut interest rates in September and said it would restart bond purchases, has asked eurozone countries to use fiscal measures to help prod the economy forward.
Germany has so far been running a budget surplus as the country nears a recession.
European stocks fell on Monday, with the Stoxx Europe 600 losing 0.9%.
The yield on the 10-year bund fell 7 basis points to -0.57%, and the yield on the U.S. 10-year fell 5 basis points to 1.70%.
Yields move in the opposite direction to prices.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/euroz ... 2019-09-23
"Eurozone manufacturing PMI drops in September to worst level in nearly 7 years"
By Steve Goldstein
Published: Sept 23, 2019 9:38 a.m. ET
Manufacturing sentiment in the eurozone fell in September to the worst level in nearly seven years, new figures released Monday show.
The flash eurozone manufacturing purchasing managers index fell to an 83-month low of 45.6 in September, down from 47 in August.
Economists polled by FactSet expected a 47.3 reading, and any reading below 50 indicates worsening conditions.
German manufacturing PMI fell to 41.4 in September from 43.5, the worst reading in more than a decade.
The flash eurozone services PMI fell to an 8-month low of 52 from 53.5 in August, which was below the 53.2 reading expected by economists.
“The eurozone economy is close to stalling as a deepening manufacturing downturn shows further signs of spreading to the services sector,” said Chris Williamson, chief business economist at IHS Markit.
New orders for goods and services fell for the first time since January, dropping at the sharpest rate since June 2013.
The flash readings are based on 85% to 90% of typical responses.
The deterioration comes as the European Central Bank, which cut interest rates in September and said it would restart bond purchases, has asked eurozone countries to use fiscal measures to help prod the economy forward.
Germany has so far been running a budget surplus as the country nears a recession.
European stocks fell on Monday, with the Stoxx Europe 600 losing 0.9%.
The yield on the 10-year bund fell 7 basis points to -0.57%, and the yield on the U.S. 10-year fell 5 basis points to 1.70%.
Yields move in the opposite direction to prices.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/euroz ... 2019-09-23
Re: THE EUROPEANS
MARKETWATCH
"German manufacturing orders weaker than expected"
By Emese Bartha
Published: Oct 7, 2019 2:35 a.m. ET
German manufacturing orders fell August, data from the Federal Statistical Office showed Monday, boosting the likelihood of economic contraction in the third quarter in Europe’s largest economy.
Manufacturing orders declined 0.6% on the month in adjusted terms.
Economists polled by The Wall Street Journal forecast a meager 0.2% growth on the month.
On an annual comparison, orders plunged by 6.7% adjusted to calendar and price effects.
“Weak demand continued in the industry,” the Ministry of Economics said.
“The industrial business activity remains subdued for the time being,” it added.
Domestic orders fell by 2.6%, while foreign orders rose by 0.9%, the ministry said.
— Hans-Joachim Koch contributed to this article
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/germa ... 2019-10-07
"German manufacturing orders weaker than expected"
By Emese Bartha
Published: Oct 7, 2019 2:35 a.m. ET
German manufacturing orders fell August, data from the Federal Statistical Office showed Monday, boosting the likelihood of economic contraction in the third quarter in Europe’s largest economy.
Manufacturing orders declined 0.6% on the month in adjusted terms.
Economists polled by The Wall Street Journal forecast a meager 0.2% growth on the month.
On an annual comparison, orders plunged by 6.7% adjusted to calendar and price effects.
“Weak demand continued in the industry,” the Ministry of Economics said.
“The industrial business activity remains subdued for the time being,” it added.
Domestic orders fell by 2.6%, while foreign orders rose by 0.9%, the ministry said.
— Hans-Joachim Koch contributed to this article
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/germa ... 2019-10-07
Re: THE EUROPEANS
ASSOCIATED PRESS
"Turkish forces say they've captured key Syrian border town"
By MEHMET GUZEL, Associated Press
12 OCTOBER 2019
CEYLANPINAR, Turkey — Turkey's military said it captured a key Syrian border town under heavy bombardment Saturday in its most significant gain since an offensive against Kurdish fighters began four days ago, with no sign of relenting despite mounting international criticism.
Turkish troops entered central Ras al-Ayn, according to Turkey's Defense Ministry and a war monitor group.
The ministry tweeted: "Ras al-Ayn's residential center has been taken under control through the successful operations in the east of Euphrates" River.
It marked the biggest gain made by Turkey since the invasion began Wednesday.
The continued push by Turkey into Syria comes days after President Donald Trump cleared the way for Turkey's air and ground offensive, pulling back U.S. forces and saying he wanted to stop getting involved with "endless wars."
Trump's decision drew swift bipartisan criticism that he was endangering regional stability and risking the lives of Syrian Kurdish allies who brought down the Islamic State group in Syria.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces was the main U.S. ally in the fight and lost 11,000 fighters in the nearly five-year battle against IS.
Turkish troops and allied Syrian opposition fighters have made gains recently capturing several northern villages in fighting and bombardment that left dozens of people killed or wounded.
The invasion also has forced nearly 100,000 people to flee their homes amid concerns that IS might take advantage of the chaos and try to rise again after its defeat in Syria earlier this year.
The Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, called on the United States to carry out its "moral responsibilities" and close northern Syrian airspace to Turkish warplanes.
"We don't want them to send their soldiers to the front lines and put their lives in danger," the statement said.
"What we want is for them" to close the airspace for Turkish warplanes.
During a meeting Saturday in Cairo, the 22-member Arab League condemned what it described as "Turkey's aggression against Syria" and warned that Ankara will be responsible for the spread of terrorism following its invasion.
The league said Arab states might take some measures against Ankara.
It called on the U.N. Security Council to force Turkey to stop the offensive.
The Turkish offensive was widely criticized by Syria and some Western countries, which called on Turkey to cease its military operations.
Foreign Minister Heiko Maas announced Saturday that Germany would curtail its arms exports to Turkey.
Maas told the weekly Bild am Sonntag that "against the background of the Turkish military offensive in northeastern Syria, the government will not issue any new permissions for any weapons that can be used by Turkey in Syria."
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday that Turkey won't stop until the Syrian Kurdish forces withdraw below a 32 kilometer (20 mile) deep line from the border.
During the capture of Ras al-Ayn's residential center, an Associated Press journalist across the border heard sporadic clashes as Turkish howitzers struck the town and Turkish jets screeched overhead.
Syrian Kurdish forces appeared to be holding out in some areas of the town.
The SDF released two videos said to be from inside Ras al-Ayn, showing fighters saying that it was Saturday and they were still there.
The fighting was ongoing as the Kurdish fighters sought to reverse the Turkish advance into the city, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Ras al-Ayn is one of the biggest towns along the border and is in the middle of the area where Turkey plans to set up its safe zone.
The ethnically and religiously mixed town with a population of Arabs, Kurds, Armenians and Syriac Christians had been under the control of Kurdish fighters since 2013.
IS members tried to enter Ras al-Ayn following their rise in Syria and Iraq in 2014 but failed.
Most of the town's residents have fled in recent days for fear of the invasion.
Earlier Saturday, Turkish troops moved to seize control of key highways in northeastern Syria, the Turkish military and the Syrian Observatory said.
Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency said that Turkey-backed Syrian opposition forces had taken control of the M-4 highway that connects the towns of Manbij and Qamishli.
The SDF said that Turkish troops and their Syrian allies reached the highway briefly before being pushed back again.
Kurdish news agencies including Hawar and Rudaw said that Hevreen Khalaf, secretary general of the Future Syria Party, was killed Saturday as she was driving on the M-4 highway.
Rudaw's correspondent blamed Turkish forces for targeting Khalaf's car, and Hawar blamed "Turkey's mercenaries."
The Observatory said six people, including Khalaf, were killed by Turkey-backed opposition fighters on the road that they briefly cut before withdrawing.
The Turkish military aims to clear Syrian border towns of Kurdish fighters' presence, saying they are a national security threat.
Since Wednesday, Turkish troops and Syrian opposition fighters backed by Ankara have been advancing under the cover of airstrikes and artillery shelling.
Turkey has said it aims to push back the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units, or YPG, which it considers terrorists for links to a decadeslong Kurdish insurgency within its own borders.
The YPG is a main component of the SDF.
The U.N. estimated the number of displaced at 100,000 since Wednesday, saying that markets, schools and clinics also were closed.
Aid agencies have warned of a humanitarian crisis, with nearly a half-million people at risk in northeastern Syria.
A civilian wounded in a mortar strike from Syria on Friday in the Turkish border town of Suruc died, Anadolu news agency reported Saturday, bringing the civilian death toll to 18 in Turkey.
Turkey's interior minister said hundreds of mortars, fired from Syria, have landed in Turkish border towns.
The Observatory that keeps track of Syria's civil war said 74 Kurdish-led SDF fighters have been killed since Wednesday as well as 49 Syrian opposition fighters backed by Turkey.
That's in addition to 38 civilians on the Syrian side.
It added that Turkish troops now control 23 villages in northeastern Syria.
Turkey's defense ministry said it "neutralized" 459 Syrian Kurdish fighters.
The number could not be independently verified.
Four Turkish soldiers have been killed since the beginning of the offensive, including two who were killed in Syria's northwest.
France's leader warned Trump in a phone call that Turkey's military action in northern Syria could lead to a resurgence of IS activity.
President Emmanuel Macron "reiterated the need to make the Turkish offensive stop immediately," his office said in a statement Saturday.
A Kurdish police force in northern Syria said a car bomb exploded early Saturday outside a prison where IS members are being held in the northeastern city of Hassakeh.
It was not immediately clear if there were any serious injuries or deaths.
Kurdish fighters are holding about 10,000 IS fighters, including some 2,000 foreigners.
___
Associated Press writers Zeynep Bilginsoy in Istanbul and Bassem Mroue in Beirut contributed.
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/tur ... P17#page=2
"Turkish forces say they've captured key Syrian border town"
By MEHMET GUZEL, Associated Press
12 OCTOBER 2019
CEYLANPINAR, Turkey — Turkey's military said it captured a key Syrian border town under heavy bombardment Saturday in its most significant gain since an offensive against Kurdish fighters began four days ago, with no sign of relenting despite mounting international criticism.
Turkish troops entered central Ras al-Ayn, according to Turkey's Defense Ministry and a war monitor group.
The ministry tweeted: "Ras al-Ayn's residential center has been taken under control through the successful operations in the east of Euphrates" River.
It marked the biggest gain made by Turkey since the invasion began Wednesday.
The continued push by Turkey into Syria comes days after President Donald Trump cleared the way for Turkey's air and ground offensive, pulling back U.S. forces and saying he wanted to stop getting involved with "endless wars."
Trump's decision drew swift bipartisan criticism that he was endangering regional stability and risking the lives of Syrian Kurdish allies who brought down the Islamic State group in Syria.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces was the main U.S. ally in the fight and lost 11,000 fighters in the nearly five-year battle against IS.
Turkish troops and allied Syrian opposition fighters have made gains recently capturing several northern villages in fighting and bombardment that left dozens of people killed or wounded.
The invasion also has forced nearly 100,000 people to flee their homes amid concerns that IS might take advantage of the chaos and try to rise again after its defeat in Syria earlier this year.
The Syrian Democratic Forces, or SDF, called on the United States to carry out its "moral responsibilities" and close northern Syrian airspace to Turkish warplanes.
"We don't want them to send their soldiers to the front lines and put their lives in danger," the statement said.
"What we want is for them" to close the airspace for Turkish warplanes.
During a meeting Saturday in Cairo, the 22-member Arab League condemned what it described as "Turkey's aggression against Syria" and warned that Ankara will be responsible for the spread of terrorism following its invasion.
The league said Arab states might take some measures against Ankara.
It called on the U.N. Security Council to force Turkey to stop the offensive.
The Turkish offensive was widely criticized by Syria and some Western countries, which called on Turkey to cease its military operations.
Foreign Minister Heiko Maas announced Saturday that Germany would curtail its arms exports to Turkey.
Maas told the weekly Bild am Sonntag that "against the background of the Turkish military offensive in northeastern Syria, the government will not issue any new permissions for any weapons that can be used by Turkey in Syria."
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Friday that Turkey won't stop until the Syrian Kurdish forces withdraw below a 32 kilometer (20 mile) deep line from the border.
During the capture of Ras al-Ayn's residential center, an Associated Press journalist across the border heard sporadic clashes as Turkish howitzers struck the town and Turkish jets screeched overhead.
Syrian Kurdish forces appeared to be holding out in some areas of the town.
The SDF released two videos said to be from inside Ras al-Ayn, showing fighters saying that it was Saturday and they were still there.
The fighting was ongoing as the Kurdish fighters sought to reverse the Turkish advance into the city, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Ras al-Ayn is one of the biggest towns along the border and is in the middle of the area where Turkey plans to set up its safe zone.
The ethnically and religiously mixed town with a population of Arabs, Kurds, Armenians and Syriac Christians had been under the control of Kurdish fighters since 2013.
IS members tried to enter Ras al-Ayn following their rise in Syria and Iraq in 2014 but failed.
Most of the town's residents have fled in recent days for fear of the invasion.
Earlier Saturday, Turkish troops moved to seize control of key highways in northeastern Syria, the Turkish military and the Syrian Observatory said.
Turkey's state-run Anadolu news agency said that Turkey-backed Syrian opposition forces had taken control of the M-4 highway that connects the towns of Manbij and Qamishli.
The SDF said that Turkish troops and their Syrian allies reached the highway briefly before being pushed back again.
Kurdish news agencies including Hawar and Rudaw said that Hevreen Khalaf, secretary general of the Future Syria Party, was killed Saturday as she was driving on the M-4 highway.
Rudaw's correspondent blamed Turkish forces for targeting Khalaf's car, and Hawar blamed "Turkey's mercenaries."
The Observatory said six people, including Khalaf, were killed by Turkey-backed opposition fighters on the road that they briefly cut before withdrawing.
The Turkish military aims to clear Syrian border towns of Kurdish fighters' presence, saying they are a national security threat.
Since Wednesday, Turkish troops and Syrian opposition fighters backed by Ankara have been advancing under the cover of airstrikes and artillery shelling.
Turkey has said it aims to push back the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units, or YPG, which it considers terrorists for links to a decadeslong Kurdish insurgency within its own borders.
The YPG is a main component of the SDF.
The U.N. estimated the number of displaced at 100,000 since Wednesday, saying that markets, schools and clinics also were closed.
Aid agencies have warned of a humanitarian crisis, with nearly a half-million people at risk in northeastern Syria.
A civilian wounded in a mortar strike from Syria on Friday in the Turkish border town of Suruc died, Anadolu news agency reported Saturday, bringing the civilian death toll to 18 in Turkey.
Turkey's interior minister said hundreds of mortars, fired from Syria, have landed in Turkish border towns.
The Observatory that keeps track of Syria's civil war said 74 Kurdish-led SDF fighters have been killed since Wednesday as well as 49 Syrian opposition fighters backed by Turkey.
That's in addition to 38 civilians on the Syrian side.
It added that Turkish troops now control 23 villages in northeastern Syria.
Turkey's defense ministry said it "neutralized" 459 Syrian Kurdish fighters.
The number could not be independently verified.
Four Turkish soldiers have been killed since the beginning of the offensive, including two who were killed in Syria's northwest.
France's leader warned Trump in a phone call that Turkey's military action in northern Syria could lead to a resurgence of IS activity.
President Emmanuel Macron "reiterated the need to make the Turkish offensive stop immediately," his office said in a statement Saturday.
A Kurdish police force in northern Syria said a car bomb exploded early Saturday outside a prison where IS members are being held in the northeastern city of Hassakeh.
It was not immediately clear if there were any serious injuries or deaths.
Kurdish fighters are holding about 10,000 IS fighters, including some 2,000 foreigners.
___
Associated Press writers Zeynep Bilginsoy in Istanbul and Bassem Mroue in Beirut contributed.
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/tur ... P17#page=2
Re: THE EUROPEANS
REUTERS
"Turkish-led forces seize parts of Syrian town in offensive"
By Tom Perry and Daren Butler
13 OCTOBER 2019
BEIRUT/ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkish forces and their Syrian allies seized large parts of the northern Syrian town of Suluk, a war monitor said on Sunday, as they pressed on with their offensive against Kurdish militia for a fifth day in the face of fierce international opposition.
Turkey is facing threats of possible sanctions from the United States unless it calls off the incursion.
Two of its NATO allies, Germany and France, have said they are halting weapons exports to Turkey and the Arab League has denounced the operation.
Ankara launched the cross-border assault against the YPG militia after U.S President Donald Trump withdrew some U.S. troops from the border region.
Turkey says the YPG is a terrorist group aligned with Kurdish militants in Turkey.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said Turkish forces and Syrian rebels entered Suluk, some 10 km (6 miles) from Turkey's border.
Turkey's state-owned Anadolu news agency said the rebels seized complete control of Suluk.
Suluk is southeast of the Syrian border town of Tel Abyad, one of the two main targets in the incursion, which was shelled by Turkish howitzers on Sunday morning, a witness in the neighboring Turkish town of Akcakale said.
Gunfire also resounded around the Syrian border town of Ras al Ain, some 120 km (75 miles) to the east of Tel Abyad, while Turkish artillery continued to target the area, a Reuters reporter across the border in Turkey's Ceylanpinar said.
Turkish-backed Syrian rebels, known as the National Army, advanced into Ras al Ain on Saturday but by Sunday there were still conflicting reports on who held control.
The Syrian Observatory monitoring group said the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in which the YPG comprises the main fighting element, had recovered "almost full control" of Ras al Ain after a counter attack.
A spokesman for the National Army denied this, saying its forces were still in the positions they took on Saturday.
130,000 DISPLACED
Turkey's incursion has raised international alarm over its mass displacement of civilians and the possibility of Islamic State militants escaping from Kurdish prisons.
The Kurdish-led forces have been key allies for the United States in eliminating the jihadist group from northern Syria.
More than 130,000 people have been displaced from rural areas around Tel Abyad and Ras al Ain as a result of the fighting, the United Nations said on Sunday.
In a statement, the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said OCHA and other relief agencies estimated up to 400,000 civilians in the Syrian conflict zone may require aid and protection in the coming period.
In the latest criticism, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson expressed "grave concern" to Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, saying the offensive may worsen the humanitarian situation and undermine progress against Islamic State.
"He urged the President to end the operation and enter into dialogue," a spokesman for Johnson said after a telephone call between the two leaders on Saturday evening.
Turkey's Defence Ministry said on Sunday that 480 YPG militants had been "neutralized" since the operation began, a term that commonly means killed.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based organization that reports on the war, said 74 Kurdish-led fighters, 49 Turkey-backed Syrian rebels and 30 civilians have been killed in the fighting.
In Turkey, 18 civilians have been killed in cross-border bombardment, Turkish media and officials say.
ISLAMIC STATE ESCAPEES
The SDF holds most of the northern Syrian territory that once made up Islamic State's "caliphate" in the country.
It has been keeping thousands of fighters from the jihadist group in jail and tens of thousands of their family members in camps.
The Kurdish-led administration for northern and eastern Syria said the offensive was nearing a camp for displaced people holding thousands of members of "Islamic State (IS) families".
Around 100 people - women affiliated with IS and their children - have escaped from the camp, the Observatory said.
The shelling of the camp at Ain Issa, north of Raqqa and about 30 km (20 miles) south of the border represented "support for the revival of the Daesh organization", the Kurdish-led administration said, referring to IS militants.
Addressing the U.N. Security Council, the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State and other international parties, the Kurdish-led administration urged them "to bear your responsibilities and to intervene quickly to prevent a catastrophe whose effects will not be limited to Syria alone but will knock on all your doors when matters get out of control".
Islamic State has claimed responsibility for a car bomb on Friday in Qamishli, the largest city in the Kurdish-held area, where some IS militants fled from a jail.
On Saturday Trump defended his decision to withdraw troops from the Syrian border region, telling conservative Christian activists that the United States should prioritize protecting its own borders.
"Let them have their borders, but I don't think our soldiers should be there for the next 50 years guarding a border between Turkey and Syria when we can't guard our own borders at home," Trump said in a speech in Washington.
Turkey's stated objective is to set up a "safe zone" inside Syria to resettle many of the 3.6 million Syrian war refugees it has been hosting.
Erdogan has threatened to send them to Europe if the EU does not back his assault.
He has also dismissed the growing condemnation of the operation, saying that Turkey "will not stop it, no matter what anyone says".
The SDF accused Turkey-backed rebel fighters of killing a Kurdish politician in a road ambush on Saturday.
The rebel force denied it, saying it had not advanced that far.
The Syrian Observatory said Turkey-backed groups had killed nine civilians on the road, including Hervin Khalaf, co-chair of the secular Future Syria Party.
(Reporting by Daren Butler in Istanbul, Tom Perry in Beirut and Reuters correspondents in the region, Kirsti Knolle in Vienna; Editing by Elaine Hardcastle and Frances Kerry)
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/tur ... P17#page=2
"Turkish-led forces seize parts of Syrian town in offensive"
By Tom Perry and Daren Butler
13 OCTOBER 2019
BEIRUT/ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkish forces and their Syrian allies seized large parts of the northern Syrian town of Suluk, a war monitor said on Sunday, as they pressed on with their offensive against Kurdish militia for a fifth day in the face of fierce international opposition.
Turkey is facing threats of possible sanctions from the United States unless it calls off the incursion.
Two of its NATO allies, Germany and France, have said they are halting weapons exports to Turkey and the Arab League has denounced the operation.
Ankara launched the cross-border assault against the YPG militia after U.S President Donald Trump withdrew some U.S. troops from the border region.
Turkey says the YPG is a terrorist group aligned with Kurdish militants in Turkey.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group said Turkish forces and Syrian rebels entered Suluk, some 10 km (6 miles) from Turkey's border.
Turkey's state-owned Anadolu news agency said the rebels seized complete control of Suluk.
Suluk is southeast of the Syrian border town of Tel Abyad, one of the two main targets in the incursion, which was shelled by Turkish howitzers on Sunday morning, a witness in the neighboring Turkish town of Akcakale said.
Gunfire also resounded around the Syrian border town of Ras al Ain, some 120 km (75 miles) to the east of Tel Abyad, while Turkish artillery continued to target the area, a Reuters reporter across the border in Turkey's Ceylanpinar said.
Turkish-backed Syrian rebels, known as the National Army, advanced into Ras al Ain on Saturday but by Sunday there were still conflicting reports on who held control.
The Syrian Observatory monitoring group said the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in which the YPG comprises the main fighting element, had recovered "almost full control" of Ras al Ain after a counter attack.
A spokesman for the National Army denied this, saying its forces were still in the positions they took on Saturday.
130,000 DISPLACED
Turkey's incursion has raised international alarm over its mass displacement of civilians and the possibility of Islamic State militants escaping from Kurdish prisons.
The Kurdish-led forces have been key allies for the United States in eliminating the jihadist group from northern Syria.
More than 130,000 people have been displaced from rural areas around Tel Abyad and Ras al Ain as a result of the fighting, the United Nations said on Sunday.
In a statement, the U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said OCHA and other relief agencies estimated up to 400,000 civilians in the Syrian conflict zone may require aid and protection in the coming period.
In the latest criticism, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson expressed "grave concern" to Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan, saying the offensive may worsen the humanitarian situation and undermine progress against Islamic State.
"He urged the President to end the operation and enter into dialogue," a spokesman for Johnson said after a telephone call between the two leaders on Saturday evening.
Turkey's Defence Ministry said on Sunday that 480 YPG militants had been "neutralized" since the operation began, a term that commonly means killed.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a UK-based organization that reports on the war, said 74 Kurdish-led fighters, 49 Turkey-backed Syrian rebels and 30 civilians have been killed in the fighting.
In Turkey, 18 civilians have been killed in cross-border bombardment, Turkish media and officials say.
ISLAMIC STATE ESCAPEES
The SDF holds most of the northern Syrian territory that once made up Islamic State's "caliphate" in the country.
It has been keeping thousands of fighters from the jihadist group in jail and tens of thousands of their family members in camps.
The Kurdish-led administration for northern and eastern Syria said the offensive was nearing a camp for displaced people holding thousands of members of "Islamic State (IS) families".
Around 100 people - women affiliated with IS and their children - have escaped from the camp, the Observatory said.
The shelling of the camp at Ain Issa, north of Raqqa and about 30 km (20 miles) south of the border represented "support for the revival of the Daesh organization", the Kurdish-led administration said, referring to IS militants.
Addressing the U.N. Security Council, the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State and other international parties, the Kurdish-led administration urged them "to bear your responsibilities and to intervene quickly to prevent a catastrophe whose effects will not be limited to Syria alone but will knock on all your doors when matters get out of control".
Islamic State has claimed responsibility for a car bomb on Friday in Qamishli, the largest city in the Kurdish-held area, where some IS militants fled from a jail.
On Saturday Trump defended his decision to withdraw troops from the Syrian border region, telling conservative Christian activists that the United States should prioritize protecting its own borders.
"Let them have their borders, but I don't think our soldiers should be there for the next 50 years guarding a border between Turkey and Syria when we can't guard our own borders at home," Trump said in a speech in Washington.
Turkey's stated objective is to set up a "safe zone" inside Syria to resettle many of the 3.6 million Syrian war refugees it has been hosting.
Erdogan has threatened to send them to Europe if the EU does not back his assault.
He has also dismissed the growing condemnation of the operation, saying that Turkey "will not stop it, no matter what anyone says".
The SDF accused Turkey-backed rebel fighters of killing a Kurdish politician in a road ambush on Saturday.
The rebel force denied it, saying it had not advanced that far.
The Syrian Observatory said Turkey-backed groups had killed nine civilians on the road, including Hervin Khalaf, co-chair of the secular Future Syria Party.
(Reporting by Daren Butler in Istanbul, Tom Perry in Beirut and Reuters correspondents in the region, Kirsti Knolle in Vienna; Editing by Elaine Hardcastle and Frances Kerry)
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/tur ... P17#page=2
Re: THE EUROPEANS
MARKETWATCH
"Syrian troops move north, setting up potential clash with Turkish forces"
By Associated Press
Published: Oct 14, 2019 4:49 p.m. ET
AKCAKALE, Turkey — Syrian government troops moved into towns and villages in northeastern Syria on Monday, including the flashpoint region of Manbij, setting up a potential clash with Turkish-led forces advancing in the area as long-standing alliances in the region began to shift or crumble following the pullback of U.S. forces.
The Syrian military’s deployment near the Turkish border came after Syrian Kurdish forces previously allied with the U.S. said they had reached a deal with President Bashar Assad’s government to help them fend off Turkey’s invasion, now in its sixth day.
Assad’s return to the region his troops abandoned in 2012 at the height of the Syrian civil war is a turning point in Syria’s eight-year civil war, giving yet another major boost to his government and its Russian backers and is like to endanger, if not altogether crush, the brief experiment in self-rule set up by Syria’s Kurds since the conflict began.
The rapidly changing situation was set in motion last week, when President Donald Trump ordered American troops in northern Syria to step aside, clearing the way for an attack by Turkey, which regards the Kurdish fighters as terrorists.
Since 2014, the Kurds have fought alongside the U.S. in defeating the Islamic State in Syria, and Trump’s move was decried at home and abroad as a betrayal of an ally.
Faced with unrelenting criticism, Trump said Monday he was putting new sanctions on Turkey, halting trade negotiations and raising steel tariffs in an effort to pressure Ankara to stop its offensive.
In the past five days, Turkish troops and their allies have pushed into northern towns and villages, clashing with the Kurdish fighters over a stretch of 125 miles.
The offensive has displaced at least 130,000 people.
“Where is the United Nations?"
"Let them come see the blood of our children on the floor!"
"Why don’t they show up?” cried a medic at the Tal Tamr hospital, which received dozens of injured people from nearby Turkish shelling in recent days.
Abandoned in the middle of the battlefield, the Kurds turned to Assad and Russia for protection and announced Sunday night that Syrian government troops would be deployed in Kurdish-controlled towns and villages along the border to help repel the Turkish advance.
Kurdish official Aldar Khalil said in a statement that the aim of the agreement is for Syrian troops to be deployed along the border, except for the area between the towns of Ras al-Ayn and Tal Abyad, where Turkish troops are advancing.
He added that the autonomous authority will continue to run daily affairs in northeast Syria.
“There is an understanding between SDF and Damascus — a military agreement only,” said Badran Ciya Kurd, a senior Kurdish official, referring to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.
He has been in talks with Russians since the start, and he made his comments in an interview with The Associated Press.
Syrian state media broadcast repeated footage of government forces entering northern towns and villages with residents chanting slogans in support of Assad, while others rushed to hug the soldiers.
In a northern village, residents welcomed the troops by showering them with rice, an Arab gesture of welcome.
In another village, dozens of young men rode motorcycles as some waved posters of Assad.
“We are going back to our normal positions that are at the border,” said a Syrian officer, as embattled Kurdish authorities invited the government to retake towns and villages in the north.
“May God protect the army!” residents responded.
The dramatic events are a crushing blow to the dreams of Syria’s Kurds who had built up a degree of autonomy that was unthinkable before the war, when they were an oppressed minority by the Assad family rule.
The ethnic group grew from an underdog in Syria to a prestigious group that controls about 30% of Syrian territory, working hand in hand with the Americans to defeat the Islamic State group.
A return by Assad’s forces to their region is a major shift in Syria’s long-running civil war, further cementing Assad’s hold over the ravaged country.
The Syrian troops arrived in the northern province of Raqqa aboard buses and pickup trucks with mounted machine guns.
Troops moved into the towns of Tal Tamr, about 12 miles from the Turkish border, Ein Issa and Tabqa, known for its dam on the Euphrates River and a nearby air base of the same name.
They later entered the Kurdish-held town of Manbij, in a race with Turkey-backed opposition fighters advancing in the same direction.
The Manbij region is home to U.S. outposts that were set up in 2017 to patrol the tense frontiers between Turkish-controlled areas and the Kurdish-held side of northern Syria.
A U.S. official said troops are still in the town, preparing to leave.
Earlier, Syrian fighters backed by Turkey said they began an offensive alongside Turkish troops to capture Manbij, which is on the western flank of the Euphrates River, broadening their campaign east of the river.
Mustafa Sejari, an official with the Turkey-backed fighters, tweeted: “The battle of Manbij has begun.”
Turkey’s private NTV television reported that Turkish special forces and commandos began advancing toward Manbij in the afternoon.
CNN-Turk also mentioned the attack, reporting that the sound of clashes could be heard.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan signaled earlier in the day his military was ready to begin the assault Manbij, with a goal of returning the city to Arab populations that he said were its rightful owners.
Speaking later in Baku, Azerbaijan, Erdogan said Turkey’s military offensive into northeast Syria is as “vital” to Turkey as its 1974 military intervention in Cyprus, which split the island.
Erdogan also made clear Turkey would not halt its offensive despite the widespread condemnation.
The military action by Ankara sets up a potential clash between Turkey and Syria and raises the specter of a resurgent Islamic State group as the U.S. relinquishes any remaining influence in northern Syria to Assad and his chief backer, Russia.
Turkey warned its NATO allies in Europe and the United States not to stand in its way.
Trump said the roughly 1,000 U.S. troops he ordered out of Syria would remain in the Middle East to prevent a resurgence of the IS threat.
The European Union unanimously condemned Turkey’s military move and asked all 28 of its member states to stop selling arms to Ankara, Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Borrell told the AP.
In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Russian and Turkish officials have remained in close contact.
Russia appeared to be working on de-confliction between Turkish and Syrian troops.
Erdogan has already said Turkey will not negotiate with the Syrian Kurdish fighters, saying they have links to a long-running Kurdish insurgency within its own borders.
Syria’s state-run news agency SANA said government forces planned to “confront the Turkish aggression,” without giving further details.
Photos posted by SANA showed several vehicles and a small number of troops in Tal Tamr, a predominantly Assyrian Christian town that was once held by IS before it was retaken by Kurdish-led forces.
Many Syrian Christians, who make up about 10 percent of Syria’s prewar population of 23 million, left for Europe in the past 20 years, with the flight gathering speed since the conflict began in March 2011.
Heavy fighting on Sunday reached a Kurdish-run camp for displaced persons in Ein Issa.
The camp is home to about 12,000 people, including around 950 wives and children of IS fighters, and hundreds are believed to have escaped amid the chaos.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/syria ... latestnews
"Syrian troops move north, setting up potential clash with Turkish forces"
By Associated Press
Published: Oct 14, 2019 4:49 p.m. ET
AKCAKALE, Turkey — Syrian government troops moved into towns and villages in northeastern Syria on Monday, including the flashpoint region of Manbij, setting up a potential clash with Turkish-led forces advancing in the area as long-standing alliances in the region began to shift or crumble following the pullback of U.S. forces.
The Syrian military’s deployment near the Turkish border came after Syrian Kurdish forces previously allied with the U.S. said they had reached a deal with President Bashar Assad’s government to help them fend off Turkey’s invasion, now in its sixth day.
Assad’s return to the region his troops abandoned in 2012 at the height of the Syrian civil war is a turning point in Syria’s eight-year civil war, giving yet another major boost to his government and its Russian backers and is like to endanger, if not altogether crush, the brief experiment in self-rule set up by Syria’s Kurds since the conflict began.
The rapidly changing situation was set in motion last week, when President Donald Trump ordered American troops in northern Syria to step aside, clearing the way for an attack by Turkey, which regards the Kurdish fighters as terrorists.
Since 2014, the Kurds have fought alongside the U.S. in defeating the Islamic State in Syria, and Trump’s move was decried at home and abroad as a betrayal of an ally.
Faced with unrelenting criticism, Trump said Monday he was putting new sanctions on Turkey, halting trade negotiations and raising steel tariffs in an effort to pressure Ankara to stop its offensive.
In the past five days, Turkish troops and their allies have pushed into northern towns and villages, clashing with the Kurdish fighters over a stretch of 125 miles.
The offensive has displaced at least 130,000 people.
“Where is the United Nations?"
"Let them come see the blood of our children on the floor!"
"Why don’t they show up?” cried a medic at the Tal Tamr hospital, which received dozens of injured people from nearby Turkish shelling in recent days.
Abandoned in the middle of the battlefield, the Kurds turned to Assad and Russia for protection and announced Sunday night that Syrian government troops would be deployed in Kurdish-controlled towns and villages along the border to help repel the Turkish advance.
Kurdish official Aldar Khalil said in a statement that the aim of the agreement is for Syrian troops to be deployed along the border, except for the area between the towns of Ras al-Ayn and Tal Abyad, where Turkish troops are advancing.
He added that the autonomous authority will continue to run daily affairs in northeast Syria.
“There is an understanding between SDF and Damascus — a military agreement only,” said Badran Ciya Kurd, a senior Kurdish official, referring to the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.
He has been in talks with Russians since the start, and he made his comments in an interview with The Associated Press.
Syrian state media broadcast repeated footage of government forces entering northern towns and villages with residents chanting slogans in support of Assad, while others rushed to hug the soldiers.
In a northern village, residents welcomed the troops by showering them with rice, an Arab gesture of welcome.
In another village, dozens of young men rode motorcycles as some waved posters of Assad.
“We are going back to our normal positions that are at the border,” said a Syrian officer, as embattled Kurdish authorities invited the government to retake towns and villages in the north.
“May God protect the army!” residents responded.
The dramatic events are a crushing blow to the dreams of Syria’s Kurds who had built up a degree of autonomy that was unthinkable before the war, when they were an oppressed minority by the Assad family rule.
The ethnic group grew from an underdog in Syria to a prestigious group that controls about 30% of Syrian territory, working hand in hand with the Americans to defeat the Islamic State group.
A return by Assad’s forces to their region is a major shift in Syria’s long-running civil war, further cementing Assad’s hold over the ravaged country.
The Syrian troops arrived in the northern province of Raqqa aboard buses and pickup trucks with mounted machine guns.
Troops moved into the towns of Tal Tamr, about 12 miles from the Turkish border, Ein Issa and Tabqa, known for its dam on the Euphrates River and a nearby air base of the same name.
They later entered the Kurdish-held town of Manbij, in a race with Turkey-backed opposition fighters advancing in the same direction.
The Manbij region is home to U.S. outposts that were set up in 2017 to patrol the tense frontiers between Turkish-controlled areas and the Kurdish-held side of northern Syria.
A U.S. official said troops are still in the town, preparing to leave.
Earlier, Syrian fighters backed by Turkey said they began an offensive alongside Turkish troops to capture Manbij, which is on the western flank of the Euphrates River, broadening their campaign east of the river.
Mustafa Sejari, an official with the Turkey-backed fighters, tweeted: “The battle of Manbij has begun.”
Turkey’s private NTV television reported that Turkish special forces and commandos began advancing toward Manbij in the afternoon.
CNN-Turk also mentioned the attack, reporting that the sound of clashes could be heard.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan signaled earlier in the day his military was ready to begin the assault Manbij, with a goal of returning the city to Arab populations that he said were its rightful owners.
Speaking later in Baku, Azerbaijan, Erdogan said Turkey’s military offensive into northeast Syria is as “vital” to Turkey as its 1974 military intervention in Cyprus, which split the island.
Erdogan also made clear Turkey would not halt its offensive despite the widespread condemnation.
The military action by Ankara sets up a potential clash between Turkey and Syria and raises the specter of a resurgent Islamic State group as the U.S. relinquishes any remaining influence in northern Syria to Assad and his chief backer, Russia.
Turkey warned its NATO allies in Europe and the United States not to stand in its way.
Trump said the roughly 1,000 U.S. troops he ordered out of Syria would remain in the Middle East to prevent a resurgence of the IS threat.
The European Union unanimously condemned Turkey’s military move and asked all 28 of its member states to stop selling arms to Ankara, Spanish Foreign Minister Josep Borrell told the AP.
In Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Russian and Turkish officials have remained in close contact.
Russia appeared to be working on de-confliction between Turkish and Syrian troops.
Erdogan has already said Turkey will not negotiate with the Syrian Kurdish fighters, saying they have links to a long-running Kurdish insurgency within its own borders.
Syria’s state-run news agency SANA said government forces planned to “confront the Turkish aggression,” without giving further details.
Photos posted by SANA showed several vehicles and a small number of troops in Tal Tamr, a predominantly Assyrian Christian town that was once held by IS before it was retaken by Kurdish-led forces.
Many Syrian Christians, who make up about 10 percent of Syria’s prewar population of 23 million, left for Europe in the past 20 years, with the flight gathering speed since the conflict began in March 2011.
Heavy fighting on Sunday reached a Kurdish-run camp for displaced persons in Ein Issa.
The camp is home to about 12,000 people, including around 950 wives and children of IS fighters, and hundreds are believed to have escaped amid the chaos.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/syria ... latestnews
Re: THE EUROPEANS
THE WALL STREET JOURNAL
"U.S. Weighs Leaving More Troops, Sending Battle Tanks to Syria"
Gordon Lubold, Nancy A. Youssef
25 OCTOBER 2019
WASHINGTON—The White House is considering options for leaving about 500 U.S. troops in northeast Syria and for sending dozens of battle tanks and other equipment, officials said Thursday, the latest in an array of scenarios following President Trump’s decision this month to remove all troops there.
The options, presented by military officials, would represent a reversal from the American withdrawal Mr. Trump wanted.
It also would modify U.S. objectives — from countering Islamic State extremists to also safeguarding oil fields in eastern Syria with additional troops and new military capability.
Washington sees the fields as potential leverage in future negotiations over Syria.
“We will NEVER let a reconstituted ISIS have those fields!” Mr. Trump said Thursday in a Twitter message, referring to Islamic State.
The options for tanks and troops, which hasn’t been decided, were being discussed in Washington as Defense Secretary Mark Esper, in Brussels, urged U.S. allies at a North Atlantic Treaty Organization meeting to respond to Turkey’s incursion into Syria earlier this month.
Mr. Esper’s request came amid fissures in the security bloc’s approach to the crisis and over the Trump administration’s policy shifts.
Mr. Trump earlier this month ordered all U.S. troops out of northern Syria, a move that was criticized by Kurdish fighters allied with the U.S. as an abandonment.
Critics say Turkey launched the mission because it believed Mr. Trump greenlighted the move during an Oct. 6 call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Mr. Trump said he didn’t give a go-ahead for the assault.
The U.S. leader then imposed sanctions on Turkey and threatened to destroy the NATO ally’s economy before lifting the sanctions when Turkey announced a cease-fire.
Mr. Esper said he supported a proposal this week by German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer to create an international security zone in northern Syria with Russia and Turkey, which have already made their own deal to secure the region.
Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer outlined her proposal at the NATO meeting, noting that the Russia-Turkey deal was insufficient to bring long-term peace.
“There are different views,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters Thursday evening.
“This was an open and frank discussion among friends and allies."
"There is strong support for a political solution.”
Mr. Trump, after ordering all U.S. forces out of northeastern Syria in early October, said later that he would agree to leave about 200 troops in northeast Syria to safeguard oil fields.
The move came after Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) outlined the potential importance of the oil.
Mr. Graham suggested in remarks to reporters at the Capitol on Thursday that American troops would end up securing the oil fields.
He was among eight to 10 senators briefed by the White House on Thursday.
“There are some plans coming together from the Joint Chiefs that I think may work, that may give us what we need to prevent ISIS from coming back, Iran taking the oil, ISIS from taking the oil,” he said.
“I am somewhat encouraged that a plan is coming about that will meet our core objectives in Syria.”
The top U.S. envoy for Syria, James Jeffrey, said in testimony Wednesday before the House Foreign Affairs Committee that the U.S. also may hang onto a Syrian airfield.
“We do contemplate, I believe, maintaining one of our two airfields that are there,” Mr. Jeffrey said.
The option of sending tanks was earlier reported by Newsweek.
While the Trump administration’s plans for U.S. troops in Syria shifts, so do the plans for what to do with the approximately 1,000 U.S. troops, most of them special operations forces, following Mr. Trump’s order to withdraw.
Mr. Esper said over the weekend that most of the troops would go to neighboring Iraq, triggering a pointed reaction from Baghdad, where officials said those troops would only be able to remain for a period of four weeks.
Meeting at NATO headquarters, Mr. Esper criticized Ankara for its assault.
“Turkey’s unwarranted incursion into northern Syria jeopardizes the gains made there in recent years,” Mr. Esper said.
“Turkey put us all in a terrible situation,” he added later.
For NATO, disagreement over how to address Turkey’s actions strikes another blow to the unity of an alliance already rocked by Mr. Trump’s frequent broadsides over what he says is insufficient military spending by allies.
French President Emmanuel Macron — whose country has special forces in northern Syria — has responded with anger over the abrupt U.S. move to withdraw troops from Syria, which he said he learned about on Twitter.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has further exasperated NATO allies by deepening his relationship with President Vladimir Putin, including through the purchase of an air-defense system from Russia.
“The direction of Turkey with regard to the alliance is heading in the wrong direction,” Mr. Esper said.
Write to Gordon Lubold at Gordon.Lubold@wsj.com and Nancy A. Youssef at nancy.youssef@wsj.com
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/u-s ... li=BBnb7Kz
"U.S. Weighs Leaving More Troops, Sending Battle Tanks to Syria"
Gordon Lubold, Nancy A. Youssef
25 OCTOBER 2019
WASHINGTON—The White House is considering options for leaving about 500 U.S. troops in northeast Syria and for sending dozens of battle tanks and other equipment, officials said Thursday, the latest in an array of scenarios following President Trump’s decision this month to remove all troops there.
The options, presented by military officials, would represent a reversal from the American withdrawal Mr. Trump wanted.
It also would modify U.S. objectives — from countering Islamic State extremists to also safeguarding oil fields in eastern Syria with additional troops and new military capability.
Washington sees the fields as potential leverage in future negotiations over Syria.
“We will NEVER let a reconstituted ISIS have those fields!” Mr. Trump said Thursday in a Twitter message, referring to Islamic State.
The options for tanks and troops, which hasn’t been decided, were being discussed in Washington as Defense Secretary Mark Esper, in Brussels, urged U.S. allies at a North Atlantic Treaty Organization meeting to respond to Turkey’s incursion into Syria earlier this month.
Mr. Esper’s request came amid fissures in the security bloc’s approach to the crisis and over the Trump administration’s policy shifts.
Mr. Trump earlier this month ordered all U.S. troops out of northern Syria, a move that was criticized by Kurdish fighters allied with the U.S. as an abandonment.
Critics say Turkey launched the mission because it believed Mr. Trump greenlighted the move during an Oct. 6 call with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
Mr. Trump said he didn’t give a go-ahead for the assault.
The U.S. leader then imposed sanctions on Turkey and threatened to destroy the NATO ally’s economy before lifting the sanctions when Turkey announced a cease-fire.
Mr. Esper said he supported a proposal this week by German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer to create an international security zone in northern Syria with Russia and Turkey, which have already made their own deal to secure the region.
Ms. Kramp-Karrenbauer outlined her proposal at the NATO meeting, noting that the Russia-Turkey deal was insufficient to bring long-term peace.
“There are different views,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters Thursday evening.
“This was an open and frank discussion among friends and allies."
"There is strong support for a political solution.”
Mr. Trump, after ordering all U.S. forces out of northeastern Syria in early October, said later that he would agree to leave about 200 troops in northeast Syria to safeguard oil fields.
The move came after Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) outlined the potential importance of the oil.
Mr. Graham suggested in remarks to reporters at the Capitol on Thursday that American troops would end up securing the oil fields.
He was among eight to 10 senators briefed by the White House on Thursday.
“There are some plans coming together from the Joint Chiefs that I think may work, that may give us what we need to prevent ISIS from coming back, Iran taking the oil, ISIS from taking the oil,” he said.
“I am somewhat encouraged that a plan is coming about that will meet our core objectives in Syria.”
The top U.S. envoy for Syria, James Jeffrey, said in testimony Wednesday before the House Foreign Affairs Committee that the U.S. also may hang onto a Syrian airfield.
“We do contemplate, I believe, maintaining one of our two airfields that are there,” Mr. Jeffrey said.
The option of sending tanks was earlier reported by Newsweek.
While the Trump administration’s plans for U.S. troops in Syria shifts, so do the plans for what to do with the approximately 1,000 U.S. troops, most of them special operations forces, following Mr. Trump’s order to withdraw.
Mr. Esper said over the weekend that most of the troops would go to neighboring Iraq, triggering a pointed reaction from Baghdad, where officials said those troops would only be able to remain for a period of four weeks.
Meeting at NATO headquarters, Mr. Esper criticized Ankara for its assault.
“Turkey’s unwarranted incursion into northern Syria jeopardizes the gains made there in recent years,” Mr. Esper said.
“Turkey put us all in a terrible situation,” he added later.
For NATO, disagreement over how to address Turkey’s actions strikes another blow to the unity of an alliance already rocked by Mr. Trump’s frequent broadsides over what he says is insufficient military spending by allies.
French President Emmanuel Macron — whose country has special forces in northern Syria — has responded with anger over the abrupt U.S. move to withdraw troops from Syria, which he said he learned about on Twitter.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has further exasperated NATO allies by deepening his relationship with President Vladimir Putin, including through the purchase of an air-defense system from Russia.
“The direction of Turkey with regard to the alliance is heading in the wrong direction,” Mr. Esper said.
Write to Gordon Lubold at Gordon.Lubold@wsj.com and Nancy A. Youssef at nancy.youssef@wsj.com
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/u-s ... li=BBnb7Kz
Re: THE EUROPEANS
MARKETWATCH
"German economy continues to struggle with manufacturing troubles spreading to services"
By Steve Goldstein
Published: Oct 24, 2019 8:15 a.m. ET
The German economy is continuing to struggle, new data released Thursday shows, with the difficulties of its export-oriented base extending to the service sector as global trade dries up.
The IHS Markit flash German manufacturing PMI inched up to 41.9 in October from September’s decade-worst 41.7, which is still a reading that shows the factory segment of the country’s economy in dire straits.
Readings below 50 indicate contraction.
The flash German services PMI meanwhile fell to a 37-month low of 51.2 in October from 51.4.
The manufacturing data was in line with forecasts, while the services figures lagged expectations of a 51.7 reading, according to FactSet.
IHS said the employment component of the composite index with both manufacturing and services fell for the first time in six years.
As global trade wilts in the face of conflicts across the globe, the German government has debated, but not instituted, fiscal stimulus.
The International Monetary Fund says Germany’s fiscal space is “substantial” after years of running surpluses.
For the eurozone as a whole, the manufacturing PMI rose to a 2-month high of 46.2, while the flash services PMI rose to 51.8 from 51.6.
Economists had expected a 46 reading on manufacturing and a 51.9 reading on services, according to a FactSet poll.
An improved performance out of France kept the eurozone composite index above the 50 mark, at 50.2 in October.
The flash data is based on 85% to 90% of survey responses in a month.
European stocks were stronger on Thursday, while the yield on the 10-year German bund was steady at -0.39%.
The European Central Bank as expected held interest rates in negative territory during Mario Draghi’s last meeting as president.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/germa ... 2019-10-24
"German economy continues to struggle with manufacturing troubles spreading to services"
By Steve Goldstein
Published: Oct 24, 2019 8:15 a.m. ET
The German economy is continuing to struggle, new data released Thursday shows, with the difficulties of its export-oriented base extending to the service sector as global trade dries up.
The IHS Markit flash German manufacturing PMI inched up to 41.9 in October from September’s decade-worst 41.7, which is still a reading that shows the factory segment of the country’s economy in dire straits.
Readings below 50 indicate contraction.
The flash German services PMI meanwhile fell to a 37-month low of 51.2 in October from 51.4.
The manufacturing data was in line with forecasts, while the services figures lagged expectations of a 51.7 reading, according to FactSet.
IHS said the employment component of the composite index with both manufacturing and services fell for the first time in six years.
As global trade wilts in the face of conflicts across the globe, the German government has debated, but not instituted, fiscal stimulus.
The International Monetary Fund says Germany’s fiscal space is “substantial” after years of running surpluses.
For the eurozone as a whole, the manufacturing PMI rose to a 2-month high of 46.2, while the flash services PMI rose to 51.8 from 51.6.
Economists had expected a 46 reading on manufacturing and a 51.9 reading on services, according to a FactSet poll.
An improved performance out of France kept the eurozone composite index above the 50 mark, at 50.2 in October.
The flash data is based on 85% to 90% of survey responses in a month.
European stocks were stronger on Thursday, while the yield on the 10-year German bund was steady at -0.39%.
The European Central Bank as expected held interest rates in negative territory during Mario Draghi’s last meeting as president.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/germa ... 2019-10-24
Re: THE EUROPEANS
MARKETWATCH
"Flash eurozone manufacturing PMI slips to a 2-month low"
By Steve Goldstein
Published: Dec 16, 2019 4:03 a.m. ET
The flash reading of the IHS Markit manufacturing purchasing managers index fell in December to a two-month low of 45.9, while the services PMI edged up to a 4-month high of 52.4 from 51.9.
Any reading below 50 indicates contracting conditions.
Economists polled by FactSet expected a 47.3 reading for manufacturing and a 52 reading for services.
IHS Markit said it was the worst quarter since the economy pulled out of its downturn in the second half of 2013.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/flash ... 2019-12-16
"Flash eurozone manufacturing PMI slips to a 2-month low"
By Steve Goldstein
Published: Dec 16, 2019 4:03 a.m. ET
The flash reading of the IHS Markit manufacturing purchasing managers index fell in December to a two-month low of 45.9, while the services PMI edged up to a 4-month high of 52.4 from 51.9.
Any reading below 50 indicates contracting conditions.
Economists polled by FactSet expected a 47.3 reading for manufacturing and a 52 reading for services.
IHS Markit said it was the worst quarter since the economy pulled out of its downturn in the second half of 2013.
https://www.marketwatch.com/story/flash ... 2019-12-16