Turkey denies soldiers entered Syria but insists on right ‘to defend itself’

Turkey has denied reports some of its soldiers entered Syria over the weekend and insisted it has no plans to mobilise forces in the neighbouring country. Syria’s government had said Turkish forces were believed to be among 100 gunmen who entered Syria on Saturday with 12 pick-up trucks mounted with heavy machine guns, in an operation to supply insurgents fighting Damascus. Defence Minister Ismet Yilmaz said: “It is not true … There is no thought of Turkish soldiers entering Syria.”

[Syria] will maintain its legitimate right to respond to the Turkish crimes and attacks and to claim compensation for the damage caused.

Syrian government letters to the UN

In an increasingly complex situation, Turkey’s army shelled Kurdish YPG militia targets in northern Syria over the weekend, after the group seized an air base north of Aleppo, further complicating the conflict on NATO-member Turkey’s southern border. Ankara regards the YPG as a terrorist organization and an extension of the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has fought a 31-year-old insurgency for autonomy in southeast Turkey. Washington, which does not see the YPG as terrorists, backs the group in the fight against Islamic State in Syria.U.S. President Barack Obama urged Russia on Sunday to stop bombing “moderate” rebels in Syria in support of its ally President Bashar al-Assad, a campaign seen in the West as a major obstacle to efforts to end the war.

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