Erdogan vows to carry fight beyond Afrin
Turkish troops and Turkey-backed forces took control of the Syrian city after the Kurdish militia in power there withdrew and are now eyeing what Turkey's president calls a “terrorist corridor” along its border.
Turkish-backed forces faced little resistance when they rolled into the Syrian city of Afrin, seizing a Kurdish stronghold and knocking back their dreams of self-rule in northern Syria.
NATO member Turkey’s blitz in Afrin has further complicated Syria’s seven-year war, which has also drawn in external powers Russia, Iran and the United States. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowed on Monday his army would press on to undo Kurdish territorial gains all the way to Iraq.
A faction of the Free Syrian Army, backed by Turkish tanks and warplanes, entered Afrin on Sunday, just two months after Turkey launched an offensive to expel the People’s Protection Units (YPG) from the northwest Syrian province, arguing the Kurdish militia posed a security threat at its borders.
Civilians escaped the arrival of the FSA forces in Afrin, which had a pre-war population of 35,000 people, as the fighters raised their rebel flag and the Turkish banner in the city center, news footage showed.
