Erdogan insists in Tehran on Türkiye's operation against Kurds, despite Khamenei's warning

Just an hour after the Leader of the Islamic Republic warned about Turkey's attack on northern Syria, Recep Tayyip Erdogan emphasized at a trilateral meeting of the leaders of Turkey, Russia, and Iran in Tehran that Ankara is determined to carry out its military operation against the Kurds in northern Syria "soon."

According to AFP, on Tuesday evening, July 19, the Turkish president called the Kurdish forces "terrorists" and said: "It should be clear to everyone that there is no place in the region for separatist terrorist movements and their allies."

"We will soon continue our fight against terrorist organizations," he stressed.

While Iran, Russia, and even the United States have previously expressed their opposition to Turkey's offensive in northern Syria, the Turkish president said he expects Tehran and Moscow to support "this fight."

Turkey last attacked northern Syria in 2019, and Recep Tayyip Erdogan has repeatedly spoken in recent months of Turkey's readiness for another "military operation" in northern Syria.

The two areas that Türkiye now plans to attack are part of a 30-kilometer-wide buffer strip that Ankara wants to complete along the Turkish-Syrian border.

At the end of May, he reminded Putin that an agreement three years ago between Ankara and Moscow envisaged the creation of a "terror-free" zone along the Turkish-Syrian border.

The final trilateral statement by Iran, Russia, and Turkey in Tehran, which was released on Tuesday evening, implicitly supported Ankara's position against the Kurds and rejected any "illegitimate initiative for autonomy" that could be a reference to Kurdish forces.

But immediately in the same statement, without mentioning Turkey, it opposed "the weakening of Syria's sovereignty and territorial integrity" as well as "cross-border attacks and infiltrations."

The statement, published by the IRNA news agency, also emphasized "continuing cooperation to combat terrorism in all its forms and manifestations" and stated that "the Syrian conflict has no military solution."

International media reported that it is not yet clear whether the statement indicates a change in Iran's and Russia's positions on Türkiye's invasion of northern Syria.

Earlier, in addition to the successive trips of Hossein Amir-Abdollahian, the Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Islamic Republic, to Ankara and then Damascus to prevent "a new crisis in the region", Ali Khamenei, the Leader of the Islamic Republic, also warned on Tuesday during a meeting with Erdogan about Turkey's attack on northern Syria.

Ali Khamenei told Erdogan that a military attack on northern Syria "is definitely detrimental to Syria, Turkey, and the region."

Also, on the eve of Putin and Erdogan's visit to Tehran, the commander of a section of Syrian Kurdish forces had called on Iran and Russia to prevent a possible Turkish military attack on northern Syria.

Source: Radio Farda