Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan stated that Kurdish fighters in Syria would either lay down their arms or be “buried” amid fighting between Turkish-backed Syrian fighters and militants since the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s government, according to Euractiv.
The separatist murderers will either bid farewell to their weapons, or they will be buried in Syrian lands along with their weapons. We will eradicate the terrorist organisation that is trying to weave a wall of blood between us and our Kurdish siblings.
Since Assad’s removal, Turkey has repeatedly pushed for the dissolution of the Kurdish YPG, arguing that the group has no room in Syria’s future. Ankara views the YPG, a major unit of the US-allied Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), as an affiliate of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) militants.
The PKK, which has been fighting against the Turkish state since 1984, is recognised as a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the US and the EU. Last week, SDF commander Mazloum Abdi recognised the presence of PKK militants in Syria for the first time.
He claimed the fighters had helped fight Islamic State and would return home if a full ceasefire was reached with Turkey. Abdi, however, denied any organisational links to the PKK.
Erdoğan also announced that Turkey would soon open its consulate in Aleppo. The Turkish leader added that Ankara expected traffic at its borders to increase next summer, as some of the millions of Syrian migrants it was hosting would start to return.
