2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria
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The 2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria, code-named by Turkey as Operation Peace Spring is an ongoing military operation conducted by the Turkish Armed Forces and the Turkish-allied opposition Syrian National Army (SNA) against areas under the Autonomous Administration of North and East Syria (NES) and the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF).
On 6 October 2019, the Trump administration ordered American troops to withdraw from northeast Syria, where the United States had been supporting its Kurdish allies.
According to the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the operation is intended to expel the SDF—viewed as a terrorist organization by Turkey due to its ties with the Kurdistan Workers Party, but considered an ally against ISIL by the United States and others—from the border region, as well to create a 30 km-deep (20 mi) "safe zone" in Northern Syria where some of the 3.6 million Syrian refugees in Turkey would resettle. As the proposed settlement zone is heavily Kurdish in demographic makeup, this intention has been criticized by critics as an attempt to force a drastic demographic change, a criticism denied by Turkey by saying that it only intended to "correct" the demographics that Turkish officials asserted were changed by the SDF.
The Turkish action was condemned by the European Union, the Arab League, Iran, Israel, India and the United Kingdom as an assault on the territory of a sovereign and Arab state and an irresponsible destabilizing action with "potentially terrible" humanitarian consequences. The Syrian government has blamed the Kurds for the Turkish offensive, because of their separatism and not negotiating with the government, but has also condemned the foreign invasion of Syrian territory.
See also
- List of invasions
- Operation Olive Branch
- Operation Euphrates Shield
- Timeline of the Kurdish–Turkish conflict (1978–present)
- Timeline of the Syrian Civil War
- Turkish occupation of northern Syria
- Kurds in Syria
- Kurds in Turkey