11/7/19
ISTANBUL (Reuters) - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan accused the United States and Russia on Thursday of failing to fulfill their part of a deal for Kurdish militia to leave a Syrian region bordering Turkey, and said he would raise this with President Donald Trump next week. Turkey launched an offensive across its border with Syrian rebels a month ago, seeking to push out Kurdish YPG fighters it sees as a threat to its security. After seizing control of a 120-km (75-mile) swathe of territory, Ankara reached a deal with the United States to keep the Kurdish militia out of that area. Erdogan is set to discuss implementation in talks with Trump in Washington on Nov. 13. Turkish officials confirmed on Wednesday that the visit would go ahead, after a phone call between the leaders. “While we hold these talks, those who promised us that the YPG... would withdraw from here within 120 hours have not achieved this,” Erdogan said ahead of a visit to Hungary, referring to a deadline set in last month’s agreement. Turkish officials said earlier this week that Erdogan might call off the U.S. visit in protest at votes in the U.S. House of Representatives to recognize mass killings of Armenians a century ago as genocide and to seek sanctions on Turkey.
A senior U.S. State Department official said late on Wednesday there has been fighting in the area southeast of the Syrian border town of Ras al-Ain. It “is somewhat in dispute” whether the area is covered by the U.S. or Russian deals, the official said. “The YPG and all armed forces have certainly withdrawn from the vast majority of our area,” the official said. “Erdogan is never all that specific in his broadside attacks on us or anybody else.” Under the two bilateral deals, Ankara stopped its offensive in return for the withdrawal of the YPG fighters. Turkish and Russian soldiers have so far held two joint patrols near the border to monitor implementation of their agreement. Ankara began its offensive after Trump announced an abrupt withdrawal of 1,000 U.S. troops from northern Syria in early October. The U.S. president has since said that some troops will continue to operate there.
