Turkish Defense Ministry has issued a statement on Thursday saying that the country will only consider pulling its military out of Syria if the border is completely secured and if they are satisfied that the “terrorism” threat is fully resolved.
Ministry spokesman Zeki Akturk said that Turkey’s military presence was perfectly in keeping with “right to legitimate defense under international law.” Turkey had removed much of its military from northern Syria after the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS) took power in December, but has continued to remain in the northeast, intermittently supporting attacks on the Kurdish SDF.
The Kurds retaining control in parts of the Syria-Turkey border is a main part of this statement, as Turkish officials routinely present the SDF’s largest component force, the YPG, as a terrorist organization and equate it with the Turkish-based PKK, an ideologically similar though distinct organization.
US and Turkish soldiers operating jointly in northern Syria | Image from Picryl
Akturk just two weeks ago presented Syria’s failure to full disarm the Kurds as a “threat to Turkish security.” Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa told journalists yesterday there was a possibility Turkey could launch an offensive against the Syrian Kurds.
Sharaa met with Turkey’s intelligence chief Ibrahim Kalin shortly before making those comments to journalists. Kalin reportedly reiterated support for bilateral ties with Syria, though clearly differences remain on the status of the Kurds.
There have been reports suggesting that the HTS is also preparing a potential offensive against the Kurdish parts of the country, and Turkey’s continued support for the HTS is probably not wholly unrelated to this, as the HTS has repeatedly said they intend to impose full control over the entire country, including Kurdish territory.
At the same time, the SDF and the Syrian government agreed on integration in February. That process has stalled amid Kurdish efforts to retain some measure of political decentralization in the northeast, though the agreement did not come with an explicit timetable, and was meant to be a starting point for further negotiation. Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said that Turkey still has “reservation” about the integration in general, but will allow Syria to try to proceed with it.
