Kurdistan - Page 4

A Turkish court ordered the continued detention of American Pastor Andrew Brunson on Monday, deeming him a flight risk and placing him in what advocates call an “extremely grim” prison on charges of having used his Christian sermons to promote Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen.

The government of Iraq announced Wednesday that it was considering special forces and ground operations against the Islamic State in neighboring Iraq, a battleground already featuring at least ten major military actors fighting each other.

The Iraqi security troops rekindled their relationship with the Kurdish Peshmerga forces this week as Iraq faces an Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) resurgence.

The Pentagon refused to confirm the accuracy of media reports that the United States military is intensifying its presence in northern Syria’s Manbij region, only indicating that the U.S. is engaged in talks with Turkey to de-escalate the tensions in the area in a statement to Breitbart News Wednesday.

The United States is carrying out a routine “review” of its operations in Syria, U.S. President Donald Trump’s special envoy for the coalition against the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) declared on Tuesday in response to the commander-in-chief’s remarks that American troops will soon pull out of the country.

The United States is contemplating boosting its military footprint in northern Syria where America’s NATO partner Turkey is on the brink of seizing more territory from U.S.-allied Kurds.

The U.S.-based representative for the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) in northern Iraq implored the Trump administration to help the region recover from the crisis it is facing after the military defeat of the Islamic State (ISIS/ISIL) in an event on Tuesday.

U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis asserted on Tuesday that the government of Turkey is correct to be concerned about Kurdish factions in Sinjar, Iraq, where they participated in eradicating the Islamic State amid an attempting suicide of the majority-Yazidi population there.

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned Iraq that his military would “do what it necessary” and attack Sinjar, site of the Islamic State’s Yazidi genocide, if Baghdad did not occupy the area and forcibly expel Kurdish forces there.

The announcement Thursday night that former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton would replace Gen. H.R. McMaster as President Donald Trump’s National Security Advisor confirms the arrival of a new, distinctive voice in the Trump administration.

Turkey insists it has reached an agreement to work with the United States to bring the fight to Manbij, Syria, as part of its post-Afrin efforts to expand its aggressive military operation to other Kurdish-held areas further east and into Iraq if necessary.

Vian Dakhil, Iraq’s only Yazidi member of parliament, denounced the use of Yazidi children as child soldiers by the Islamic State, telling the Iraqi news agency Al Sumaria this week that the victims were “brainwashed” into jihad.

The Turkish government entered Afrin city this week, the main population center of the eponymous Syrian Kurdish province, fueling fears of artificially imposed “demographic change” meant to displace local Kurds and replace them with Arabs and Turkmen.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu told reporters this weekend that the United States had reached a “common understanding” with Turkey for a plan to expel its allies, the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG/YPJ), from northern Manbij, Syria.

Masrour Barzani, the head of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG) security council in Iraq, told the outlet Kurdistan 24 during a visit to Washington this week that the Islamic State is “re-emerging” in places like Kirkuk, previously held by the Kurdish Peshmerga.

The Syrian government’s SANA news outlet reports that unspecified “popular forces” supporting dictator Bashar al-Assad have arrived in the northern province of Afrin, currently under invasion by the Turkish military.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan warned on Tuesday that the Turkish military would invade and “besiege” the heart of Afrin city Syria “in the coming days,” threatening to turn “Operation Olive Branch” into a devastating urban conflict.

The government of dictator Bashar al-Assad confirmed on Monday that it would send Syrian military troops into Afrin to fight against the Turkish military, which invaded the northern province last month.

Members of Iraq’s Iran-backed Popular Mobilization Forces (PMF/PMU) confirmed on Monday that Islamic State terrorists killed “at least 27” of their fighters and kidnapped about two dozen more near Kirkuk, a city the PMF invaded and conquered late last year.

State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert told reporters on Thursday that “sanctions are always on the table” regarding bilateral tensions, answering a question about whether Washington would ever sanction Turkey for its invasion of Syria.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson engaged in a “productive, open conversation” with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan Thursday night, State Department officials said, engaging for more than three hours on growing disagreements over Erdogan’s decision to invade Syria.

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson begins a pivotal visit to Turkey on Thursday evening intended to mend fences of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s repeated threats to attack U.S. soldiers in Syria.

The U.S. State Department dismissed increasingly aggressive rhetoric from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan directed at America as something Washington is “used to,” following a threat from Erdogan that U.S. forces would soon experience the “Ottoman slap.”

An official within the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) told the Agence France-Presse (AFP) this week that the militia would welcome the presence of Syrian government soldiers in Afrin if they fought against the ongoing Turkish invasion of that region.

Saturday morning’s violent clashes along the Israeli-Syria border between Israel on the one hand and Iran and Syrian regime forces on the other occurred against the backdrop of multiplying acts of war and violence between a seemingly endless roster of combatants.

U.S. Lt. Gen. Paul E. Funk assured reporters on a visit to Manbij, Syria, that American forces would not leave the northern city even if Turkish forces attack it. Asked about concerns that Turkey would come into direct conflict with U.S. troops, Funk said, “it’s not in my job description to worry, my job is to fight.”

The Middle Eastern outlet Kurdistan 24 interviewed Kurdish civilians in Afrin, northern Syria, who had taken to hiding in local caves from what the outlet called “heavy bombardment” of civilian areas by the Turkish military.

The United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs revealed on Tuesday that an estimated 15,000 civilians have fled Afrin, northern Syria, after the Turkish government launched an invasion of that city against the U.S.-allied Kurdish forces there.

President Donald Trump emphasized the importance of eradicating the Islamic State from the face of the earth during his first State of the Union address Tuesday night, taking credit for the group losing nearly 100 percent of its territory in Iraq and Syria.

U.S. Central Command chief General Joseph Votel confirmed on Sunday that America has no intention of withdrawing from Manbij, northern Syria, despite Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan vowing an invasion of the city following an attack on Afrin, to Manbij’s west.

A spokesman for the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), an U.S.-allied militia currently under attack by the Turkish military, claimed on Friday that the group’s fighters had successfully thwarted all attacks against them in “Operation Olive Branch.”

Turkish government sources told the newspaper Hurriyet on Thursday that the White House readout of a call between U.S. President Donald Trump and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan “does not accurately reflect” the conversation and that its contents were “not true.”

Turkey’s military General Staff claimed on Tuesday that its “Operation Olive Branch,” an invasion of Afrin in northern Syria, killed “at least 260” Kurdish and Islamic State terrorists. The United States and its Syrian Kurdish allies have both denied there being a significant ISIS presence in that area.

Turkish media have confirmed that Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu met American Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in Paris on Tuesday as U.S. envoys arrive in Ankara to discuss the “struggle against terrorism,” a salient topic as Turkey continues its military invasion of Syrian Kurdish territories on its border.

An official with Iraq’s Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) told reporters this week that the Iraqi Kurdish Peshmerga may deploy to Syria to fight the Turkish military if President Recep Tayyip Erdogan insists on “Operation Olive Branch,” the Turkish name for that nation’s invasion of Syria.

Defense Minister Nurettin Canikli affirmed that the Turkish military would cross into Syrian territory and attack U.S.-backed Kurdish fighters in that country on Friday, a move that may trigger direct clashes between Turkey and the Bashar al-Assad regime.