By: Kayhan Int’l Staff Writer

 

When hopes had risen of reason returning at last to government circles in Ankara of the need to bury the hatchet and start talks for resumption of relations with Damascus, they seem to have been dashed again following the Turkish president’s sudden threat to send more troops across the border into Syria to carve out a so-called safe zone.

President Bashar al-Assad and other senior Syrian officials have categorically rejected President Rajab Tayyeb Erdoghan’s provocative call for carving out a 30-km zone in Syria as an “aggressive, colonial threat,” saying Damascus will respond through all legitimate means to the ongoing ground offensive by Turkish forces in the northern part in Idlib Province. 

The Syrian statement added that Turkey’s measures are illegal and devoid of any legal effect, and even amount to war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The Islamic Republic of Iran, in line with its principled policy of promoting peace in the region, especially between Muslim neighbours, has called for restraint, saying “Tehran is ready to help prevent the escalation of the crisis and any conflict whose victims will be only defenseless civilians.”

Foreign Ministry Spokesman, Saeed Khatibzadeh, voicing Iran’s opposition to the use of military action by regional countries, stressed that the only way to assuage disputes between neighbours is through dialogue, rather than another incursion by Turkey into neighbouring Syria that would be considered a violation of the latter’s territorial integrity and national sovereignty.” 

It is to be noted that the crisis in Syria is because of the US-Saudi-Israeli plot to overthrow President Assad and dismember the country through macabrely murderous terrorists of all hue and colour, for whom Turkey had unfortunately opened its borders in 2011.

After failure of the Western-Zionist plot, thanks to the timely help provided to Syria by the Islamic Republic of Iran, Russia, and Lebanon’s legendry anti-terrorist movement, the Hezbollah, the Turkish military launched a cross-border invasion in October 2019 on the pretext of protecting its southern borders from what it said “rebels intending to set up an autonomous Kurdish region in Turkey.”

As a result, relations have further deteriorated between the two neighbours who over a decade ago had enjoyed cordial ties, with regular exchange of visits by senior officials of Syria and Turkey, including the presidents.

This positive atmosphere was anathema to the common enemies of both Ankara and Damascus, especially the illegal Zionist entity, which with the backing of the US and Saudi Arabia, tried to overthrow President Assad, but failed, and still continues its undeclared war against Syria through frequent airstrikes and missile barrages. 

In view of these facts, Turkey which shares a 900-km border with Syria, should realize the dangers (political, commercial, social, and environmental) facing the whole region, including its own territorial integrity, by elements aligned with the US and Israel. 

Therefore, instead of threats that would only worsen the situation, it should summon up the courage to withdraw its troops and start talks for normalization of relations, since the tense relations between Turkey and Syria are not just because of Ankara’s military interference in Idlib but also annexation of the Hatay Province in 1939, as well as water disputes resulting from the Southeastern Anatolia Project, which has resulted in reduced flow of the Euphrates and given rise to sandstorms causing ecological disasters throughout the region.