{"id":2899,"date":"2019-01-10T19:29:36","date_gmt":"2019-01-10T19:29:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/?p=2899"},"modified":"2019-01-10T19:49:50","modified_gmt":"2019-01-10T19:49:50","slug":"turkey-says-will-launch-syria-attack-if-us-delays-troop-pullout","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/2019\/01\/10\/turkey-says-will-launch-syria-attack-if-us-delays-troop-pullout\/","title":{"rendered":"Turkey says will launch Syria attack if US delays troop pullout"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Turkey<\/a> will go ahead with an offensive against Syrian Kurdish fighters in Syria if the United States<\/a>delays the withdrawal of its troops from the war-torn country, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“If the [withdrawal] is put off with ridiculous excuses like Turks are massacring Kurds, which do not reflect the reality, we will implement this decision,” he told NTV channel on Thursday.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Cavusoglu said a military operation against the US-allied Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), which it has pledged to carry out in northeastern\u00a0Syria<\/a>, is not dependent on the pullout of US troops.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“We are determined on the field and at the table … We will decide on its timing and we will not receive permission from anyone.”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turkey has long condemned the US for its military relationship with the Kurdish fighters.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ankara considers the YPG and its political wing – the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) – to be “terrorist groups” with ties to the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) in Turkey.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Last month, US President Donald Trump<\/a> said he is withdrawing some 2,000 US troops from Syria in a statement that shocked many politicians in Washington as well as Western and Kurdish allies fighting alongside the US in the war-torn country.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Trump’s decision to withdraw troops was initially expected to be carried out swiftly, but the timetable became vague in the weeks following his announcement.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

France, Britain and local armed groups have also warned that the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL<\/a>, also known as ISIS) had not been totally defeated yet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Sunday, US National Security Adviser John Bolton had set pre-conditions for the US pullout from Syria that included Turkey guaranteeing the safety of the YPG.WATCH25:45<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ankara has rejected US demands for assurances that it will not attack its Kurdish allies in Syria before the US troops withdraw from the war-torn region.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan denounced<\/a> the call for the protection of Kurdish fighters as “seriously mistaken”.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

On Wednesday, Cavusoglu said<\/a> the US is facing difficulties in parting ways with the Kurdish fighters it allied with to fight the ISIL.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

“It is hard to break up with a terrorist organisation after being involved with it at this level,” Cavusoglu said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

SOURCE: AL JAZEERA AND NEWS AGENCIES<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Turkey will go ahead with an offensive against Syrian Kurdish fighters in Syria if the United Statesdelays the withdrawal of its troops from the war-torn country, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has said. “If the [withdrawal] is put off with ridiculous excuses like Turks are massacring Kurds, which do not reflect the reality, we will implement this decision,” he told NTV channel on Thursday…. Read more »<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":112,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2899","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-article"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2899","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/112"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2899"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2899\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2903,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2899\/revisions\/2903"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2899"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2899"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/baileyonlineclassroom.com\/middleeastandnorthafricablog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2899"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}