ISTANBUL: Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday he would order an intervention to prevent any splintering of Syria, a warning aimed particularly at the country’s Kurdish forces.

“We cannot accept under any pretext that Syria be divided and if we notice the slightest risk we will take the necessary measures,” the Turkish head of state said, adding that “we have the means”.

Erdogan’s warning is the latest aimed at the Kurdish-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces and to the United States, which backed the SDF’s offensive against the militant Islamic State group. Turkiye said that it was “only a matter of time” before Syrian Kurdish fighters — seen by the West as essential in the fight against the IS group fighters — will be wiped out. “Conditions in Syria have changed. We believe it’s only a matter of time before PKK/YPG is eliminated,” Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan told a news conference in the capital Ankara.

Turkiye sees the People’s Protection Units (YPG) — the main component of the US-backed Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) -— as a terror group linked to its outlawed domestic foe the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).

Saying there is no room for “terror” in Syria, Erdogan said that “should the risk present itself, we could intervene in one night”.

Published in Dawn, January 7th, 2025