AS Turkey pushes forward with its attack on America’s former Kurdish allies in northern Syria, fears grow about what lies ahead in the region and the potential re-emergence of Islamic State.
What is happening?
The Turkish military has launched a cross-border operation against a Kurdish-led militia in north-eastern Syria that had been allied to the US. The American troops had depended on this alliance – the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) – to defeat Islamic State (IS) on the ground on Syria, but US troops withdrew.
Why?
Reports in the US suggest US President Donald Trump decided to withdraw troops from northern Syria impulsively at the close of a telephone call with Turkish President, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, on October 6.
It was a move that caught his own national security officials by surprise and has unleashed chaos. Turkey launched its operation into Syria days after this call. Dozens of civilians and fighters have already been killed on both sides.
But Trump has no regrets?
He said at the weekend that his choice may be unpopular, leaving him on an “island of one”, but argued: “I don’t think our soldiers should be there for the next 50 years guarding a border between Turkey and Syria when we can’t guard our own borders at home”.
Why did Turkey launch its assault?
Turkey regards the biggest militia in the Kurdish-led alliance – the People’s Protection Units (YPG) – as a terrorist group. It says it wants to drive them away from a "safe zone" stretching 30km into Syria.
But what about the IS detainees?
Their fate is uncertain. The SDF is detaining around 12,000 male suspects, while 70,000 displaced relatives are being held at camps.
President Trump insisted Turkey must take responsibility for the captured IS fighters and their families, and then said the US was taking custody of the most dangerous prisoners, but this is not thought to be accurate.
As the US only got two “high value” detainees out?
Alexanda Kotey and El Shafee Elsheikh, both members of a UK group of IS militants known as “the Beatles”, accused of involvement in beheadings.
Others have already escaped?
It emerged at the weekend that 800 relatives of foreign IS members have already vanished from one camp.
Now there is a new alliance?
President Bashar al-Assad of Syria, backed by Russia, controls the southern part of the country and wants to retake it all. Now the Syrian army will deploy along the entire length of the border to aid the SDF.
What now?
Escalating chaos.
Humanitarian agency, the United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA), says up to 160,000 civilians are now on the move.
SDF chief Mazloum Abdi said of the new alliance that “it is hard to know whom to trust”, but “If we have to choose between compromises and the genocide of our people, we will surely choose life for our people.”
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