Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov on Wednesday reaffirmed Moscow’s co-operation with Turkey in Syria, and expressed concern over threats on Turkey’s southern border.
However, Moscow seeks to convince Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan to drop his plan to drive Kurdish forces from a 30km-wide border zone in Syria as this could risk clashes with Russian forces which support the Syrian army.
To avoid this scenario, Turkish foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said that Russia must implement 2019 commitments to expel Kurdish fighters from the Turkish-Syrian border zone and replace them with Syrian army troops. Mr Lavrov said Vladimir Putin and Mr Erdogan would meet next month.
Mr Erdogan has repeatedly declared his intention of “cleansing terrorists” from the Syrian towns of Tel Rifaat and Manbij which are held by the US-backed Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG). Ankara accuses the YPG of being an offshoot of the separatist Turkish Kurdistan Workers Party, which has battled the Turkish army for nearly four decades.
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Although Turkey has not yet launched a full-scale offensive in Syria, tension is high along the frontier due to skirmishes between Turkish-supported Syrian jihadi groups and the YPG.
The fragile stand-off has prompted the Syrian government to reinforce troops north of Aleppo city and Russia to deploy warplanes, helicopters, and an air defence system at the airport of the eastern city of Qamishli. Iran-affiliated forces have moved into the region to prevent Sunni Turkey from capturing Shia towns while the Syrian Democratic Forces have vowed to join the Syrian army in defence of the border zone, risking the involvement of 900 US troops based in the Kurdish-held area.
According to Fehim Tastekin writing on Al-Monitor website, Mr Erdogan is “expected to refrain from ordering [an invasion] without a green light from the United States, the main backer of the Syrian Kurds, or Russia, the main ally of the Syrian government”. A greenlight is not likely. While the US has objected to Mr Erdogan’s plan, Russia has urged him to reach an agreement on security co-operation with the Syrian government.
While this is essentially what Mr Cavusoglu has demanded, it would amount to a loss of face for Mr Erdogan. He has supported Syrian insurgents since unrest erupted in 2011, but the secular government of president Bashar al-Assad remains in place. In 2015, Russia intervened with air power, weapons and military advisers, enabling the government to regain control of 70 per cent of the country.
Since the war wound down in 2019, Moscow and Ankara have worked together to avert major outbreaks of violence although Turkey has seized enclaves of Syrian territory along the frontier and collaborated with al-Qaeda affiliate Haya’t Tahrir al-Sham in its takeover of Syria’s northwestern Idlib province.
