Akar: Turkey closely monitoring the situation in Northern Syria

Brussels: Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar confirmed that his country is closely monitoring the events in northern Syria.

Akar told reporters at the headquarters of the Permanent Mission of Turkey to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in Brussels, in response to a question about the attacks of the YPG organization, the Syrian arm of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK): " We are closely following events there and will do what is necessary at the appropriate time and place." Akar stressed that the presence of his country's forces in Idlib contributes to preventing the massacres of the Syrian regime and the occurrence of new waves of migration.

"We have agreements with the United States and Russia (regarding some areas in northern Syria) and we have implemented our role in these agreements in the best possible way. We continue to do so, and we remind our counterparts to play their role as well."

The Turkish Defense Minister indicated that ceasefire in Idlib is still in place, and there is stability in the situation, despite the presence of some violations, clashes and attacks from time to time, pointing out that after the meeting of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin in Sochi, the situation has become more quiet.

Idlib and other areas in northern Syria have witnessed a military escalation, for more than 3 months, by the Syrian regime forces. Turkish forces there were also subjected to separate attacks that resulted in the killing of a number of soldiers and the wounding of others.

It is noteworthy that the guarantor countries of the Astana track on Syria (Turkey, Russia and Iran) announced in mid-September 2017, that they had reached an agreement providing for the establishment of a de-escalation zone in the north of the country, according to an agreement signed in May of the same year.

Within this framework, Idlib and its surroundings were included in the "de-escalation zone". Turkey and Russia signed in September 2018 the Sochi agreement in order to establish ceasefire in Idlib, according to which the Syrian opposition withdrew its heavy weapons from the area covered by the agreement.