ANKARA (Dispatches) -- Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Saturday he would discuss the deployment of Syrian government forces in a planned "safe zone” in northern Syria during talks with Russia’s President Vladimir Putin next week, but warned Ankara would "implement its own plans” if a solution was not reached.
Turkey agreed with the United States on Thursday to pause its military offensive in northeastern Syria for five days while Kurdish fighters withdrew from a "safe zone”. Erdogan will visit Sochi for emergency talks with Putin on what steps to take next.
Speaking at an opening ceremony in the central Turkish province of Kayseri, Erdogan also said Turkey would "crush the heads” of Kurdish militants in northern Syria if they did not withdraw from the area during the 120-hour period.
The deal announced late Thursday is intended to halt the Turkish invasion launched on October 9, on condition Kurdish militants pull out of the "safe zone" on the Syrian side of the border.
The offensive has killed dozens of civilians, mainly on the Kurdish side, and prompted hundreds of thousands to flee their homes in the latest humanitarian crisis of Syria's eight-year war.
Erdogan warned that, if the pullout does not happen, "we will start where we left off and continue to crush the terrorists' heads."
The top figure on the Kurdish side, SDF commander Mazloum Abdi, told AFP that Turkey was preventing his forces' withdrawal and trying to blame the deal's collapse on the Kurds.
"The Turks are preventing the withdrawal from the Ras al-Ain area, preventing the exit of our forces, the wounded and civilians," Abdi said in a phone interview from Syria.
Almost at the same moment, the so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported artillery shelling on Ras al-Ain and surrounding villages by Turkey's proxies, the latest bombardment of the area since the truce.
The massively outgunned Kurds have agreed to the deal, whereby they should pull out of an Arab-majority area that includes Ras al-Ain and stretches about 120 kilometers (75 miles) along the border.
The Turkish defense ministry earlier had blamed the SDF for not upholding the ceasefire. "Despite this, terrorists... carried out a total of 14 attacks in the last 36 hours," it said.
Turkish troops and its proxies seized part of the town on Thursday, hitting a hospital.
Turkey wants to push Kurdish fighters away from its southern border by establishing a 30-kilometre deep "safe zone" on the Syrian side of the frontier.
On Friday, Turkish airstrikes and mortar fire by allied Syrian fighters killed 14 civilians near Ras al-Ain, according to the Observatory.
Mazloum Abdi said the U.S. was not doing enough to force Ankara to abide by the agreement, which was brokered by U.S. Vice President Mike Pence.
"If there is no commitment, we shall consider what happened to a game between the Americans and Turkey -- on one side preventing the troop withdrawal while on the other claiming our forces did not withdraw," he said.
Earlier this month, U.S. President Donald Trump announced he would withdraw US troops from northern Syria, in a move that was seen as green-lighting a Turkish attack.
The U.S. troops that had been deployed near the Turkish border have pulled back to areas not affected by the invasion but have not yet left the country.
The Turkish advance and chaos that ensued sparked concerns that thousands of Daesh terrorists and their family members in Kurdish custody could break out and bring about a resurgence of the extremist group.
U.S. Senate majority leader Mitch McConnell called Trump's decision "a strategic nightmare".
The local Kurdish administration is now counting on Syrian government forces to keep Turkey and its proxies at bay along the border.
Syrian troops on Wednesday entered the strategic Kurdish-populated city of Kobani, officially known as Ain al-Arab, as part of an agreement between the government of President Bashar al-Assad and Kurdish authorities.
Earlier, they entered the city of Raqqah, the former de facto capital of Daesh, for the first time in five years.
On Monday, Syrian government forces arrived in the towns of Tabqa, on the outskirts of Raqqah, and Ain Issa, which served as the headquarters of the Kurdish- administration in northeastern Syria.
On Friday, President Assad Syrian demanded a complete halt to Turkey's invasion and a full withdrawal of foreign forces illegally present in Syrian territories.
During a meeting with a Russian delegation headed by the Kremlin’s special envoy on Syria Alexander Lavrentiev in Damascus, Assad said efforts must be directed at ending the presence of occupying forces, including U.S. and Turkish troops.
The Syrian people are entitled to resistance to expel them by all available means, Assad said.
Lavrentiev, for his part, stressed Moscow’s firm support for Syria’s sovereignty and territorial integrity.
The Kremlin’s special envoy to Syria further noted that Russia rejects any step or action that violates Syria’s sovereignty, further complicates the crisis there and negatively affects attempts aimed at settlement of the conflict.
On Thursday, Assad said Damascus would give an appropriate response to the ground invasion by Turkish soldiers.
"No matter what false slogans could be made up for the Turkish offensive, it is a flagrant invasion and aggression,” Assad told visiting Iraqi National Security Adviser Falih al-Fayyadh in Damascus.
"Syria has frequently hit (Turkish-backed) proxies and terrorists in more than one place. Syria will respond to the assault and confront it anywhere within the Syrian territory through all legitimate means available,” he added.