Turkey Launches Ground Incursion:

Syria Denounces Turkish ‘Aggression’

ANKARA (Dispatches) -- Turkish soldiers launched an overnight incursion into neighboring Syria, evacuating dozens of besieged troops guarding an Ottoman tomb and moving the crypt Sunday back to Turkey.

Date: 22 February 2015 - 20:23

News ID: ۱۱۲۷۷

The raid at the tomb of the grandfather of the founder of the Ottoman Empire saw hundreds of troops backed by tanks cross the border near the frontier town of Kobani once besieged by ISIL terrorists.
Turkey was widely criticized for not intervening for months in the Kobani battle, which finally saw Kurdish fighters push out the extremists.
"We had given the Turkish armed forces a directive to protect our spiritual values and the safety of our armed forces personnel," Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said in televised remarks.
Nearly 600 Turkish soldiers on some 100 tanks and armored personnel carriers crossed into Syria on Saturday night, as drones and airplanes flew reconnaissance missions overhead, Davutoglu said Sunday.
One group traveled to the tomb, some 35 kilometers (22 miles) from Turkey on the banks of the Euphrates River in Syria's embattled Aleppo province, he said. Another group seized an area only 200 meters (yards) from the Turkish border in Syria's Ashma region to be the new home for the tomb, according to a statement from President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's office.
One soldier was killed in an "accident" during the operation, Turkey's military said, without elaborating.
The U.S.-led coalition forces were informed of the Turkish operation after its launch to prevent any casualties, Davutoglu said. U.S. officials offered no immediate comment.
Syria's Foreign Ministry denounced the Turkish operation, calling it a "flagrant aggression". In a statement carried by the state news agency, it also suggested that the mission indicated a close relationship between Turkey and ISIL.
The ministry said Ankara informed the Syrian Consulate in Istanbul ahead of the operation but did not wait for approval from Damascus.
Turkey's foreign minister, Mevlut Cavusoglu, confirmed that Ankara had notified Syria before the operation that it was vacating the tomb temporarily, and that it would return to the area when it is "ready" to do so.
"We got permission from no one, we conducted it with our own initiative," he said.
In Tehran, a senior Iranian official said there is no justification for Turkey’s military operation inside the Syrian territory.
"Military action by a neighboring country on Syria's soil is by no means justified,"  Iran’s Deputy Foreign Minister for Arab and African Affairs Hussein Amir-Abdollahian told Fars news agency.
"Military intervention in Syria by its neighbors will further complicate the situation and will bear no results but causing more insecurity in the region,” he added.
Amir-Abdollahian said Iran, Saudi Arabia and Turkey should promote common political approaches for resolving problems in the region.
"Hiring irresponsible armed groups triggers a vicious cycle that will increase terrorism and make regional countries more insecure,” he said.
The tomb belonged to Suleyman Shah, the grandfather of Osman I, founder of the Ottoman Empire. The site along the Euphrates River is revered by Turkey, a strongly nationalist country whose rights there stem from a 1921 treaty with France, then the colonial power in Syria. The Ottoman Empire collapsed in the early 20th century after World War I.
In the 1970s, Turkey moved the mausoleum to its last location because the old site at a castle further south in Syria was to be inundated by the waters of a new dam.
Shah, a Turkic leader, is believed to have drowned in the Euphrates in the 13th century. His followers headed north into what is today Turkey, where they launched the Ottoman Empire. Some historians question official accounts about the Shah's tomb, saying they might have been retrospectively concocted to enrich an imperial identity for Turks.
Turkey has wanted Syrian President Bashar Assad overthrown and has backed militants fighting against him. Earlier this week, Turkey signed an agreement with the U.S. to train and arm militants fighting in Syria.