BEIRUT —
Turkish raids in northern
Syria on
Sunday struck outposts operated by the Syrian army and Kurdish-led forces,
killing three, a Britain-based war monitor said.
اضافة اعلان
The raids near the Kurdish-held border town of
Kobane targeted positions of the Syrian army and the Syrian Democratic Forces,
the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said.
The three casualties were wearing Syrian army
uniform, according to the monitor.
Several other fighters were wounded, some in
critical condition, according to the observatory, which relies on a wide
network of sources inside Syria.
The strikes were preceded by cross-border shelling
from near Kobane against Turkish forces, according to the monitor.
Last month, the Syrian government said it would
respond to direct attacks by Turkey against its forces.
The warning came after a Turkish raid on a regime
outpost near Kobane killed at least three troops in mid-August, according to
the official SANA news agency.
Turkey has launched a series of cross-border
offensives targeting Kurdish forces and Daesh since 2016, but such operations
have rarely resulted in the killing of Syrian regime fighters.
Ankara has stepped up its attacks in
Kurdish-controlled areas of Syria since a July 19 summit with Iran and Russia
failed to green-light a fresh offensive against Kurdish fighters viewed by
Ankara as terrorists.
Regime forces have deployed in areas controlled by
Kurdish fighters near the border with Turkey as part of agreements intended to
stem a fresh Turkish operation.
Last week, the
UN’s Independent Commission of
Inquiry on Syria said that “another Turkish ground operation” remains a threat
in Syria’s north, amid “continued mobilization and fighting” between Turkish
and Turkish-backed forces and Kurdish-led opponents.
“Syria cannot afford a return to larger-scale
fighting, but that is where it may be heading,” warned Paolo Pinheiro, the head
of the commission.
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