ISTANBUL: Since Donald Trump took office last week, Ankara has continued its battle against fighters, some of whom may have ties to US allies. On Wednesday, Turkey said it had killed 13 Kurdish terrorists in northern Syria and two in Iraq. The Turkish defence ministry said that the Kurdish combatants it had “neutralised” in Syria were members of the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia and the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
While the United States views the PKK and YPG as distinct organisations, having blacklisted the former as terrorists and enlisted the latter as its primary ally in Syria in the fight against Islamic State, Turkiye views the two groups as being interchangeable.
Turkiye has long urged Washington to stop backing the YPG and has said he hopes Trump would change the strategy that was left over from President Joe Biden’s previous administration. The violent skirmishes reported on Tuesday were the second in as many days; on Sunday, Turkiye also claimed to have killed 13 Kurdish insurgents. Since Syrian President Bashar Assad was overthrown last month, Turkish forces and their allies have engaged in combat with Kurdish terrorists in Syria on numerous occasions.
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