Syria: Turkish air strikes hit several northern border towns
Turkish air strikes hit several towns across northern Syria, including the city of Kobane, said Kurdish-led forces there and a Britain-based activist group.
At least six members of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and six pro-government soldiers were killed in the strikes, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
Kurdish-led forces based in Syria said at least two villages hit in the attack were populated with internally displaced people (IDPs), including areas in the eastern countryside around Kobane, also known as Ain al-Arab.
Turkey’s defence ministry said on Sunday that 89 targets, including shelters and ammunition depots, were destroyed in the air strikes.
The strikes had targeted Qandil, Asos and Hakurk in Iraq and Kobane, Tal Rifat, Cizire and Derik in northern Syria, it said, adding that “so-called directors of the terrorist organisation were among those neutralised”.
In a statement on Sunday, the SDF said it would respond to the attacks “effectively in the right time and place”.
The strikes come just days after Ankara blamed the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) for last Sunday’s deadly bombing in central Istanbul. Turkey said on Tuesday that it planned to pursue targets in northern Syria after it completed a cross-border operation against the group.
updated#Kobane, the city that defeated ISIS, is subjected to bombardment by the aircraft of the Turkish occupation.
— Farhad Shami (@farhad_shami) November 19, 2022
“#Kobane, the city that defeated ISIS, is subjected to bombardment by the aircraft of the Turkish occupation,” tweeted Farhad Shami, a spokesman for the SDF.
Turkey considers the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), the main component of the SDF, an extension of the outlawed PKK.
The PKK and SDF have denied any involvement in the Istanbul attack, in which six people were killed and 80 wounded.
The Turkish defence ministry had tweeted late on Saturday that “the hour of reckoning has come” with a photo of a fighter jet taking off.
Kobane, a Kurdish-majority town in Syria near the Turkish border, was captured by the self-proclaimed Islamic State group in late 2014, before Kurdish fighters drove them out early the following year.
