Turkey's safe zone plan for Syria aimed at destroying Kurds: Analyst

Turkey is getting more deeply involved in the Syria war. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is on a tour of Persian Gulf states, said in Bahrain on Monday that the ultimate goal of Turkey’s incursion into Syria is to create a safe zone and cleanse the border region from terrorist groups. The Syrian government, though, has on several occasions opposed Turkey’s intervention, which it views as a violation of its sovereignty. Press TV has conducted an interview with Richard Becker, with ANSWER Coalition, and Michael Lane, the founder of American Institute for Foreign Policy, to discuss the reasons why Ankara insists on creating a military safe zone inside Syria.

Michael Lane expressed support for the idea of establishing safe zones in countries that are grappling with “civil war,” saying the only setback would be the need for a massive military support for the civilian population that would be left indefensible as a result.

“Very curious move that President Erdogan would go to Bahrain to make this announcement,” he said. “The establishment of the 5,000-square-kilometer safe zone has been an objective of Turkey since last summer when they first floated the idea. What President Erdogan seems to have done in Bahrain is to double down on that and say, ‘Yes, we're going to do it. We're going to make it happen.’”

He evaluated the creation of no-fly zones as a positive move, warning however that it creates a mass of vulnerable people who are very easily attacked and do not have any way of defending themselves.

“So, once you do that, what you need to do is to provide military support for them which means a hugely increased ground presence on the part of somebody, presumably Turkey, inside Syrian territory. Also to make a safe zone really work, you do need to have a corresponding no-fly zone and that becomes very problematic under the commitments that are there today,” he underlined.

However, Richard Becker, the other panelist on the show, described the creation of a safe zone in Syria as an unacceptable idea which blatantly breaches the country’s sovereignty and would ultimately lead to the escalation of war among different factions.     

The analyst noted that the Turkish president wanted to see the Syrian government overthrown from the beginning of the struggle in 2011.

He also pointed out that Turkey regards Kurdish militants as a threat to its sovereignty; therefore, it has used the fight against Daesh in Syria as a cover to crack down on Kurds.

“So, while the Turkish government says that its priority is fighting ISIS [Daesh], I believe that really its priority is fighting against the Kurdish forces inside Syria,” he noted.

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