(Zaman Al Wasl)- At least three civilians were killed Monday by a motorbike-borne IED in Suluk, a newly-captured town by Turkish-backed rebels in northeastern Syria, local monitoring said.
The attack is the fifth in a week as IEDs and car bombs have been targeting areas taken by the Syrian National Army, according to the Raqqa Observatory for Human Rights.
Two more people lost their lives in mortar fire struck the village of al-Aridha north of Ain Issa town. One civilian was also killed in a landmine explosion near Tal Abyad town.
Meanwhile, the clashes are still underway between the Syrian National Army and the YPG-led Syrian Democratic Forces.
Sources said the SNA had seized 13 villages in a zone between the towns of Tal Tamr and Ras al-Ain.
Turkey’s foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on Monday said YPG forces have not fully withdrawn from the planned Safe Zone under a Russia-brokered accord that is about to expire.
Turkey began a military offensive in northeastern Syria targeting the YPG forces on Oct. 9 after President Donald Trump pulled U.S. troops out of the area, setting off a regional power shift that analysts say benefits Moscow and Damascus.
If the YPG does not fulfill the agreement to pull back more than 30 km (18 miles) from Turkey’s border, Turkish-led forces will “clear these terrorists from here”, he said.
“There are those who have withdrawn. (Syrian) regime elements are confirming this, Russia is confirming this as well. But it is not possible to say all of them have withdrawn,” Cavusoglu told reporters in Ankara.
On Sunday, the SDF said it had agreed to withdraw from the 30-km border region it had controlled until the U.S. troops pulled out. Russia has moved military personnel and vehicles into the region and has said the peace plan is on track.
Under the deal agreed on Oct. 22 between Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Russia’s Vladimir Putin, Syrian border guards and Russian military police are supposed to clear the region of YPG fighters over a six-day period that ends late on Tuesday.
Turkish and Russian forces are then meant to start patrolling a section of the Turkish-Syrian border that runs 10 km deep into Syria.
The deal means President Bashar al-Assad's forces moving back to parts of the northern border with Turkey for the first time in years due to the Syrian civil war, which began in 2011.
“Now, a Russian military delegation is coming (to Turkey),” Cavusoglu said. “Our friends will discuss both the latest situation on the issue of withdrawal and at the end of 150 hours (on Tuesday)... how will the patrols be, what we will do together, what steps we will take.”
(Zaman Al Wasl, Agencies
Zaman Al Wasl
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