MESOP UPDATE & SITUATION REPORT “RAQQA OPERATIONS” : Turkish-US-Russia Meeting Ends in Discord Over Kurds

8 March 2017 – Turkish official: “If [Raqqa] operation is carried out in this manner there will be a cost for Turkey-U.S. relations.”

The first meeting between Turkish, American, and Russian military commanders over Syria’s conflict has ended in discord, with Ankara criticizing Washington for its support of the Kurdish YPG militia.The discussion between the Chiefs of Staff of the military — Turkey’s Hulsi Akar, the US’s Joseph Dunford, and Russia’s Valery Gerasimov — was seeking agreement on an offensive against the city of Raqqa, the central Islamic State position in Syria. But “a senior Turkish official” said afterwards that the US appeared to have decided on the involvement of the YPG, the leading group in the US-supported Syrian Democratic Forces, in the operations.

Turkey has insisted that the YPG be excluded from any offensive. Ankara considers the Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its militia to be part of the Turkish Kurdish insurgency PKK, which has fought for decades for independence.

The Turkish official said:  It appears that the U.S. may carry out this operation with the YPG, not with Turkey. And at the same time the US is giving weapons to the YPG,” the official said.If this operation is carried out in this manner there will be a cost for Turkey-U.S. relations, because the YPG is a terrorist organization.A US defense official said that Dunford did not inform his Turkish counterpart of any decision about the Raqqa offensive. The US has backed the Kurdish-led SDF since its creation in autumn 2015 to fight the Islamic State, supplying special forces, armored vehicles, and weapons.

Turkey had set the Euphrates River in northeast Syria as a “red line”, but the SDF moved west of the river in December 2015 and has advanced as far as the city of Manbij in Aleppo Province, capturing it in June 2016.

The prospect of a showdown has arisen in the past month with a Turkish-rebel offensive taking nearby al-Bab, 30 km (19 miles) south of the Turkish-Syrian border and 40 km (25 miles) northeast of Aleppo city. Meanwhile, pro-Assad forces have seized areas south and east of al-Bab, establishing their first link with Kurdish-held territory.In a sign of the developing alliance against Turkey and the rebels, the SDF handed villages west of Manbij to the Assad regime, in a deal brokered by Russia.Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has promised that the Turkish-rebel offensive will take Manbij on its way to Raqqa.However, Prime Minster Binali Yildirim said that the operations needed to be coordinated with the US and Russia. www.mesop.de