Turkey against US support for Kurds

 

 

ISTANBUL: Turkey would not agree to any US arms transfers to Kurdish fighters who are battling Islamic State militants in Syria, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was quoted as saying yesterday, as the extremist group fired more mortar rounds near the Syrian-Turkish border and fighting around the besieged town of Kobane intensified.

Turkey views the main Syrian Kurdish group, the PYD, and its military wing which is fighting IS militants as an extension of the PKK, which has waged a 30-year insurgency in Turkey and is designated a terror group by the US and Nato. Washington has said recently that it has engaged in intelligence sharing with Kurdish fighters and officials have not ruled out future arms transfers to the Kurdish fighters.

“The PYD is for us, equal to the PKK. It is a terror organisation,” Erdogan told a group of reporters on his return from a visit to Afghanistan. “It would be wrong for the United States with whom we are friends and allies in Nato to talk openly and to expect us to say ‘yes’ to such a support to a terrorist organisation.” Erdogan’s comments were reported by the state-run Anadolu agency.

In Washington, the Texas senator Ted Cruz, a presumed candidate for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016, criticised President Barack Obama for not aiding the Kurdish fighters. “We have dropped a bomb here and a missile there, but it has been a photo-op foreign policy,” Cruz said.

Turkey’s opposition to arms transfers to the Kurdish forces, meanwhile, is hampering the US-led coalition’s efforts to fight the extremists and further complicating relations between Turkey and Washington. The countries are involved in negotiations about Ankara’s role with the US and Nato allies fighting the Islamic State group, which is attempting to capture Kobane.

Turkey has demanded that the coalition widen its campaign against the militants by providing greater aid to Syrian rebels, who are battling both IS and President Bashar Al Assad’s forces. Turkey has so far provided sanctuary to an estimated 200,000 Syrians fleeing Kobane, and recently agreed to train and equip moderate Syrian rebel fighters trying to remove Assad from power.

The White House said President Barack Obama spoke to Erdogan about the situation in Kobane and steps that could be taken to counter Isis advances.

Meanwhile, the Islamic State group was taking heavy losses in Kobane. US-led warplanes launched 11 air strikes near Kobane on Saturday and yesterday, US Central Command said, helping the town’s Kurdish defenders to repulse a new attempt to cut their supply lines into Turkey.

The Kurdish fighters, who have been under IS assault for more than a month, weathered fierce street fighting and at least two jihadist suicide bombings but the front line remained unchanged yesterday, a Kurdish official said. “(IS) brought in reinforcements… and attacked hard,” Idris Nassen said. “But thanks to air strikes and (the Kurdish fighters’) response, they did not make any progress.”

The IS fighters suffered heavy losses in Kobane, which has become a key prize as it is being fought under the gaze of the world’s press massed just over the border in Turkey. From Saturday into yesterday morning, a total of 31 jihadists died in the battle, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Coalition air strikes near Kobane hit 20 IS fighting positions, five IS vehicles and two IS-held buildings, said the Central Command.

AP/AFP