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Russia, Turkey, Iran discuss Syria ceasefire implementation in Astana

Russian soldiers patrol a street in Aleppo Syria

ASTANA (Reuters) – Experts from Russia, Turkey, Iran and the United Nations held a technical meeting in Kazakhstan’s capital, Astana, to discuss in detail the implementation of the Syrian ceasefire agreement, Kazakhstan’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday.

“Representatives of Jordan are expected to take part for the first time,” a ministry spokesman said of the talks.

He said the agenda included reviewing the implementation of the cessation of hostilities, discussing a proposal from the Syrian armed opposition about the ceasefire, and determining options about how to implement it.

Fighting and air strikes have plagued the ceasefire agreement between the government and rebel groups since it took effect in late December, with the combatants accusing each other of violations.

“This is about creating a mechanism to control the implementation of the ceasefire,” the ministry spokesman said.

The ministry gave no information about the line-up of the delegations, who were meeting behind closed doors.

After the talks, Russian negotiator, chief command official Stanislav Gadzhimagomedov, said the sides had also discussed preventing provocations and securing humanitarian access.

“The delegations have confirmed their readiness to continue interaction in order to achieve the full implementation of the cessation of hostilities in Syria,” he said.

(Reporting by Raushan Nurshayeva; Writing by Olzhas Auyezov; Editing by Dominic Evans)

Syrian army says it will press on against Islamic State near Aleppo

Syrian soldiers guarding checkpoint in area with Islamic State

By John Davison and Tom Perry

BEIRUT (Reuters) – The Syrian army signaled on Thursday it would press on with operations against Islamic State northeast of Aleppo, in a veiled warning to Turkey which backs a separate military campaign in northern Syria.

Syrian government forces have rapidly driven Islamic State back in the last two weeks, advancing to within 6 km (4 miles) of the city of al-Bab that the jihadists are fighting to hold.

The army’s gains risk sparking a confrontation with Turkey, which has sent tanks and warplanes across the border to support Syrian insurgents who are trying to seize al-Bab in a separate offensive.

Turkey’s offensive, launched last year, aims to drive both Islamic State and Syrian Kurdish fighters away from its borders, as Turkey sees both groups as a security threat.

Syria’s military general command said government forces and their allies had recaptured more than 30 towns and villages from Islamic State, and a 16 km (10 mile) stretch of the highway that links Aleppo to al-Bab to the northeast.

“This achievement widens the secured areas around Aleppo city and is the starting point for (further) operations against Daesh (Islamic State),” a military spokesman said in a statement broadcast on state TV.

The military “confirms its commitment to … protecting civilians and maintaining the unity of the territory of the Syrian Arab Republic,” the statement added, in a remark apparently directed at Turkey.

Turkey’s offensive has brought the rebel factions it backs – some of which have also fought against President Bashar al-Assad’s forces in Aleppo – to the outskirts of al-Bab, according to a group that monitors the war.

Ankara last week denied that Turkey would hand over al-Bab to Assad after driving out Islamic State.

A source in the military alliance fighting in support of Assad told Reuters on Wednesday the Syrian army aimed to reach al-Bab and was ready “to clash with the FSA fighting” alongside the Turkish army if necessary.

Turkey launched its “Euphrates Shield” campaign in Syria to secure its frontier from Islamic State and halt the advance of the powerful Kurdish YPG militia. Helping rebels to topple Assad is no longer seen as a priority for Ankara.

The Euphrates Shield campaign has carved out an effective buffer zone controlled by Turkey-backed rebel groups, obstructing the YPG’s plans of linking up Kurdish controlled areas in northeastern and northwestern Syria.

The YPG, backed by the United States, is separately also battling Islamic State, and Washington’s backing for the Kurdish fighters has created tension with Turkey.

ISLAMIC STATE ASSAULTS

Fighting between Syrian forces, backed by Russia, and Islamic State has meanwhile intensified elsewhere in the country in recent weeks, with the group on the offensive in several areas of Syria while it is driven back inside its Mosul stronghold in neighboring Iraq.

Government forces clashed with the militants west of the historic city of Palmyra late on Wednesday, in an attempt to recover ground recently lost, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights monitoring group reported.

The army made some progress and took over farmland around the village of al-Tayas, 50 km (30 miles) west of Palmyra and near the T4 air base, but dozens of Syrian troops have been killed in the latest clashes in the area, the British-based Observatory said.

The jihadists seized Palmyra and some nearby oil fields in December for a second time in the nearly six-year Syrian conflict. They had been driven out by the army and its allies in March.

Further southwest the army fought Islamic State near the al-Seen military airport, the Observatory said.

Islamic State on Sunday launched an attack on the airport, 70 km northeast of Damascus, it said, adding that dozens of Syrian soldiers and militants had died in several days of fighting.

Government forces have recaptured at least one village in the area, the Observatory and a military media unit run by Assad’s ally Hezbollah said.

Islamic State fighters have also been attacking the remaining pockets of government-held territory in the city of Deir al-Zor in eastern Syria, long besieged by the group. Heavy Russian air strikes have targeted Islamic State in the area. Deir al-Zor province is almost entirely held by Islamic State.

(Reporting by John Davison and Tom Perry; Editing by Tom Heneghan and Dominic Evans)

Cyprus leaders seek new U.N. peace summit in early March: envoy

Cypriot flag

ATHENS (Reuters) – The leaders of ethnically-split Cyprus have asked the United Nations to prepare for a new peace conference in early March with guarantor powers Britain, Turkey and Greece, a U.N. envoy said on Wednesday.

Greek and Turkish Cypriot leaders Nicos Anastasiades and Mustafa Akinci also agreed at a meeting to reconvene weekly through the month of February to try to resolve outstanding issues, envoy Espen Barth Eide said.

“The leaders requested the United Nations to prepare, in consultation with the guarantor powers, for the continuation of the Conference on Cyprus at political level in early March,” Eide said in a statement.

“They underscored their strong resolve and determination to maintain the current momentum,” said Eide, a former Norwegian foreign minister who has been one of a long line of envoys trying to broker peace on the eastern Mediterranean island.

Cyprus was a British colony until 1960 and its Greek and Turkish Cypriot communities have lived estranged on either side of a U.N.-monitored ceasefire line since 1974, when Turkish forces invaded the island in response to a brief coup by Greek Cypriot militants seeking union with Greece.

The seeds of partition were planted years earlier when Turkish Cypriots withdrew from a power-sharing system after the outbreak of communal violence, which spurred the dispatch of what is now one of the oldest U.N. peacekeeping contingents.

One of the 1960 treaties under which Cyprus was granted independence allows Greece, Turkey and Britain intervention rights in the event of a breakdown of constitutional order.

The foreign ministers of guarantor powers Britain, Greece and Turkey met Cypriot leaders in Geneva in mid-January to weigh security guarantees, seen as crucial to a reunification deal.

That meeting was inconclusive. Turkey and Turkish Cypriots insisted on continued guarantor status while Greece and the Greek Cypriots insisted the current system be dismantled, saying Turkey had abused it with its 1970s invasion and continued stationing of 30,000 troops in northern Cyprus.

(Reporting by Michele Kambas; editing by Mark Heinrich)

Turkey dismissed more than 90,000 public servants in post-coup purge: minister

Turkey Parliament

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkish authorities have dismissed more than 90,000 public servants for alleged connections to a coup attempt in July as part of a purge critics say has broadened to target any political opposition to President Tayyip Erdogan.

Speaking to reporters at a roundtable interview broadcast on television, Labour Minister Mehmet Muezzinoglu said 125,485 people from the public service had been put through legal proceedings after the coup attempt, and that 94,867 of those had been dismissed so far.

Turkey has been rooting out followers of the U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, whom it accuses of having infiltrated state institutions and plotted to overthrow the government. Gulen, who has lived in self-imposed exile in Pennsylvania since 1999, has denied the charge and condemned the coup.

Some 40,000 people from the police, the military, the judiciary, the civil service or the education system, have been remanded in custody pending trial for alleged connections with the coup attempt, during which at least 240 people were killed.

Emergency rule declared after the failed coup attempt enables the government to bypass parliament in enacting new laws and to limit or suspend rights and freedoms when deemed necessary.

Rights groups and some of Turkey’s Western allies fear that President Tayyip Erdogan is using the coup as a pretext to stifle dissent, from state institutions to political parties.

NATO member Turkey has been hit by a spate bombings and shootings in the past year, claimed by Kurdish and Islamic State militants, on top of July’s failed coup, in which soldiers commandeered tanks and fighter jets in a bid to seize power.

(Reporting by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by Ece Toksabay and Ralph Boulton)

Syrian groups see more U.S. support for IS fight, plan new phase

People work to clean damaged Aleppo

By Tom Perry

BEIRUT (Reuters) – A U.S.-backed alliance of Syrian militias said on Tuesday it saw signs of increased U.S. support for their campaign against Islamic State with President Donald Trump in office, a shift that would heighten Turkish worries over Kurdish power in Syria.

A Kurdish military source told Reuters separately the next phase of a campaign by the U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) alliance — which includes the Kurdish YPG militia — aimed to cut the last remaining routes to Islamic State’s stronghold of Raqqa city, including the road to Deir al-Zor.

The YPG has been the main partner on the ground in Syria for the U.S.-led coalition against Islamic State, fighting as part of the SDF that has driven Islamic State from swathes of northern Syria with the coalition’s air support.

The YPG also has links to a Kurdish party, the PKK, designated by Turkey as a terrorist group.

It forms the military backbone of autonomous regions that have been set up by Kurdish groups and their allies in northern Syria since the onset of the war in 2011, alarming Turkey where a Kurdish minority lives just over the border. The main Syrian Kurdish groups say their aim is autonomy, not independence.

SDF spokesman Talal Silo told Reuters the U.S.-led coalition supplied the SDF with armored vehicles for the first time four or five days ago. Although the number was small, Silo called it a significant shift in support. He declined to give an exact number.

“Previously we didn’t get support in this form, we would get light weapons and ammunition,” he said. “There are signs of full support from the new American leadership — more than before — for our forces.”

He said the vehicles would be deployed in the campaign against Islamic State which has since November focused on Raqqa city, Islamic State’s base of operations in central Syria.

The first two phases of the offensive focused on capturing areas to the north and west of Raqqa, part of a strategy to encircle the city.

The third phase would focus on capturing remaining areas, including the road between Raqqa city and Deir al-Zor, the Kurdish military source said.

IS holds nearly all of Deir al-Zor province, where it has been fighting hard in recent weeks to try to capture the last remaining pockets of Syrian government-held territory in Deir al-Zor city.

Cutting off Raqqa city from IS strongholds in Deir al-Zor would be a major blow against the group.

“The coming phase of the campaign aims to isolate Raqqa completely,” said the Kurdish military source, who declined to be named. “Accomplishing this requires reaching the Raqqa-Deir al-Zor road,” the source said.

“This mission will be difficult.”

Silo of the SDF said preparations were underway for “new action” against IS starting in “a few days”, but declined to give further details.

(Writing by Tom Perry; Editing by Janet Lawrence and Sonya Hepinstall)

Turkey threatens to cancel Greece migration deal in soldiers’ extradition row

Turkish soldiers who fled to Greece after Turkey Coup

ANKARA (Reuters) – Turkey has demanded the retrial of eight soldiers who fled to Greece after a failed coup last year and said it may take measures, including scrapping a migration deal with Athens, after a Greek court rejected an extradition request.

Greece’s Supreme Court on Thursday ruled against extraditing the soldiers, who have sought political asylum, saying they feared for their lives in Turkey. Ankara says they were involved in the July 15 coup attempt and branded them traitors.

“We demanded that the eight soldiers be tried again. This is a political decision, Greece is protecting and hosting coup plotters,” Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told state broadcaster TRT Haber on Friday.

“We are evaluating what we can do. There is a migration deal we signed, including a readmission deal with Greece, and we are evaluating what we can do, including the cancellation of the readmission deal with Greece,” Cavusoglu added.

Subsequently, a European Union spokeswoman said it was confident its cooperation with Turkey on migration will continue to hold firm.

Relations between Greece and Turkey, neighbors and NATO allies, have improved over the years but they remain at odds over territorial disputes and ethnically split Cyprus. In 1996, they almost reached the brink of war over an uninhabited islet.

The two countries play an important role in the handling of Europe’s worst migration crisis in decades and the EU depends on Ankara to enforce a deal to stem mass migration to Europe.

(Reporting by Ece Toksabay and Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by Daren Butler and Angus MacSwan)

Greek Supreme Court denies extradition of Turkish soldiers who fled after coup attempt

Turkey soldiers who fled to greece after failed coup

ATHENS (Reuters) – Greece’s Supreme Court ruled against the extradition of eight Turkish soldiers who fled to Greece in July after a failed coup attempt in Turkey, a decision which is likely to anger Ankara.

Turkey has demanded Greece extradite them, alleging they were involved in the coup attempt and has branded them traitors.

The men — three majors, three captains and two sergeant-majors — landed a helicopter in northern Greece on July 16 and sought political asylum saying they feared for their lives in Turkey. They deny playing a role in the attempt to oust President Tayyip Erdogan, which led to a purge of the military and civil service.

“The possibility of their rights being violated or reduced regardless of the degree of guilt or the gravity of the crimes they are accused of does not allow the implementation of extradition rules,” a Supreme Court president said.

The court ruled that the soldiers, who have been kept in protective custody pending final decisions on their asylum applications, must be freed. The rulings cannot be overturned.

Their lawyer Christos Mylonopoulos said the verdict was “a big victory for European values”.

The soldiers have been accused in Turkey of attempting to abrogate the constitution, attempting to dissolve parliament and seizing a helicopter using violence and for attempting to assassinate Erdogan.

The case has highlighted the sometimes strained relations between Greece and Turkey, neighbors and NATO allies at odds over a series of issues ranging from the divided island of Cyprus to air fights over the Aegean Sea.

The two countries play an important role in the handling of Europe’s worst migration crisis in decades and the EU depends on Ankara to enforce a deal to stem mass migration to Europe.

(Reporting by Constantinos Georgizas,; Writing by Renee Maltezou, Editing by Angus MacSwan)

Hundreds of police trained by Turkey start work in northern Syria

police squad from Turkey

By Khalil Ashawi

JARABLUS, Syria (Reuters) – A new Syrian police force trained and equipped by Turkey started work in a rebel-held border town on Tuesday, a sign of deepening Turkish influence in northern Syria, where it has helped drive out Islamic State militants in recent months.

Casually referred to as the “Free Police”, in reference to the Free Syrian Army (FSA) alliance of moderate rebel groups which Turkey backed in its campaign against Islamic State along the Turkish border, many of the first 450 recruits are former rebel fighters.

The new, armed security force is made up of regular police and special forces, who wear distinctive light blue berets. They are Syrians, but received five weeks of training in Turkey. Some wore a Turkish flag patch on their uniforms at the inauguration ceremony on Tuesday.

It operates out of a newly opened police station in the Syrian border town of Jarablus but hopes to expand into other areas freed from Islamic State militants by Turkey-backed rebels, officials said.

FSA fighters took Jarablus from Islamic State in August, the first town to fall to Turkey’s “Operation Euphrates Shield”. That operation has steadily ousted the jihadists from the Syria-Turkish border, while also preventing Kurdish militias gaining ground in their wake.

Turkey-backed rebels now control a more than 100-km stretch along the Syria-Turkish border.

Turkey has long supported rebels fighting Syrian President Bashar al-Assad in a complex, multi-faceted conflict. The war has divided Syria into a patchwork of areas controlled by Kurdish militias, Islamic State and various rebel groups.

The Police and National Security Force is a sign of a deepening Turkish influence in north Syria, with the new police cars and station having both Turkish and Arabic writing on them.

“Our mission is to maintain security and preserve property and to serve civilians in the areas liberated (from Islamic State),” police force head General Abd al-Razaq Aslan told Reuters.

Aslan said Turkey had provided material and logistical support that would make the new security forces highly effective.

The opening ceremony was attended by the governor of Gaziantep, a Turkish city near the border. It has become a hub for opponents of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad during the nearly six-year conflict.

Governor Ali Yerlikaya said Turkey will continue to support areas taken from Islamic State militarily and by providing other services.

(Writing by Lisa Barrington in Beirut, reporting by Khalil Ashawi in Jarabus, northern Syria, editing by Larry King)

Jihadists in Syria launch assault on rebels attending peace talks

hotel hosting Syria peace talks

By Tom Perry

BEIRUT (Reuters) – A jihadist group launched a major assault on Free Syrian Army factions in Syria as they attended peace talks in Kazakhstan, rebel officials said on Tuesday, igniting a new conflict among insurgents that could further strengthen the government’s hand.

The attack by jihadist group Jabhat Fateh al-Sham targeted FSA groups in northwestern Syria in an area representing the rebellion’s main territorial foothold after the opposition’s defeat in Aleppo last month.

Fateh al-Sham could not immediately be reached for comment. The group was previously known as the Nusra Front, and changed its name after announcing it was cutting ties with al Qaeda last year.

Tensions have been building between Fateh al-Sham and more moderate rebels since government forces backed by Russian air power and Iranian-backed Shi’ite militias drove the rebels out of Aleppo, a major victory for President Bashar al-Assad.

Fateh al-Sham is not covered by a shaky truce between the government and rebels brokered by Russia and Turkey, one of the main backers of the FSA groups. The aim of the meeting in Astana, organized by Russia, Turkey and Iran, is to shore up the ceasefire that came into effect on Dec. 30.

The commander of one of the FSA groups, Jaish al-Mujahideen, told Reuters the “extremely fierce” Fateh al-Sham attack aimed to “eliminate the revolution and turn it black”, a reference to the black flag flown by the jihadists in Syria.

He said the group had seized “some positions”, though these were far from its headquarters. “A comprehensive war has now started against the Golani gang,” he added, a reference to Abu Mohamad al-Golani, the leader of Fateh al-Sham.

In a statement, Jaish al-Mujahideen called for other factions to “stand as if they are one man” against the group.

DEFEATING “THE FSA IN THE NORTH”

Fateh al-Sham has a history of crushing FSA groups in the conflict that began in 2011. One of the single biggest groups in the insurgency, Fateh al-Sham has been targeted in a spate of U.S. air strikes in the northwest since the new year.

One of these killed dozens of its fighters at a training camp in Idlib last week. The Pentagon said that attack was carried out by a B-52 bomber and killed more than 100 al Qaeda fighters.

The Fateh al-Sham assault was focused in rebel-held areas to the west of Aleppo, and adjoining areas of Idlib province, which is almost entirely in insurgent hands. Tensions have also flared in that area between Fateh al-Sham and Ahrar al-Sham, a large Islamist group widely believed to be backed by Turkey.

An official in a second FSA group, Jabha Shamiya, told Reuters the attack began overnight, describing it as a large assault in several areas. The official said it was the first time Fateh al-Sham had attacked the FSA groups in that area.

“What they are doing serves Iran and the regime – so there is no FSA left in the north – particularly with the factions’ delegation now in Astana where the regime offered nothing with regards to the ceasefire,” said the Jabha Shamiya official.

The FSA groups now needed to coordinate their efforts to repel the attack, he said.

(Reporting by Tom Perry; Editing by Hugh Lawson and Dominic Evans)

Expectations low as Syria’s warring sides meet

hotel hosting the Syrian preace talks

By Olzhas Auyezov and Suleiman Al-Khalidi

ASTANA (Reuters) – Syria’s warring sides met for talks for the first time in nine months on Monday, with frosty initial exchanges suggesting chances of a significant breakthrough were slim as the country’s six-year-old conflict ground on.

They sat opposite each other at a round table in a hotel conference room before a day of negotiations – sponsored by Russia, Turkey and Iran in Kazakhstan’s capital Astana – got under way.

Both delegations said the focus was on the country’s ceasefire, a fragile precursor to a wider political solution.

But Bashar al-Jaafari, the head of the delegation representing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, said negotiators for the rebel forces had been rude and unprofessional, accusing them of defending “war crimes” committed by Jabhat Fateh al-Sham, the militant group formerly known as Nusra Front.

A rebel source said opposition representatives planned to negotiate with the government side only via intermediaries.

Mohammed Alloush, the head of the opposition delegation, told delegates he wanted to stop “the horrific flow of blood” by consolidating the shaky ceasefire and freezing military operations, saying Iran-backed militias had to leave Syria.

Russian news agency TASS cited a draft communique in which Moscow, Ankara and Tehran would commit to jointly fighting Islamic State and Jabhat Fateh al-Sham and set up a mechanism for trilateral monitoring of the ceasefire, which took effect on Dec. 30.

But fundamental divisions also remain between pro-Assad Russia and Turkey, which has supported anti-Assad rebels – including whether Syria’s president should stay in power or, as the rebels are demanding, step down.

There were no senior government figures among the delegations in Astana and Kazakhstan’s foreign ministry said it expected the meetings to be over by midday on Tuesday.

OVERSEEING CEASEFIRE

Some observers said the talks, which UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura is attending, could help jump-start U.N.-led negotiations that were suspended in late April.

De Mistura said it was crucial to get a mechanism to oversee and implement a nationwide ceasefire in place to build confidence.

“That by itself … would be a major achievement,” he said, adding he hoped Astana could pave the way for direct talks between the government and opposition in Geneva next month.

The Astana talks pointedly exclude the West, though Kazakhstan, with the backing of Moscow and Ankara, extended an invitation to the new U.S. administration last week, which Washington declined.

Iranian officials have said they strongly oppose U.S. involvement, though George Krol, the U.S. ambassador to Kazakhstan, attended as an observer.

Turkey and Russia – each for their own reasons – both want to disentangle themselves from the fighting. That has pushed them into an ad hoc alliance that some people believe represents the best chance for progress towards a peace deal, especially with Washington distracted by domestic issues.

The opposition arrived in Astana aware that the fall of their former urban stronghold, Aleppo, has shifted the momentum in the fighting in favor of Assad.

On Sunday, war planes bombed rebel-held areas of western Syria, killing 12 people in one location, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said, while insurgent shelling of Aleppo killed six.

“The ceasefire is clinically dead, but the Russians and Turks want to keep it alive to send a message to the international community that they are the ones in charge of the Syrian situation,” said Observatory director Rami Abdulrahman.

(Additional reporting by John Irish, Denis Dyomkin and Kinda Makieh in Astana, Michelle Nichols at the United Nations, Bozorgmehr Sharafedin in Dubai and Thomas Perry in Beirut; Writing by Olzhas Auyezov/Christian Lowe/Andrew Osborn; Editing by John Stonestreet)