Russia 'in contact' with Turkey over Idlib: Kremlin

MOSCOW

Russia said on Wednesday that it would stay in contact with Turkey to avoid further escalation in Syria's northwestern province of Idlib.

Speaking to reporters in Moscow, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov urged compliance with a 2018 Russia-Turkey memorandum on Idlib negotiated by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin in Sochi.

"We were satisfied with the agreements more than a year ago in Sochi -- and this was mutual satisfaction. We stopped being satisfied when militants and terrorist groups began taking offensive action against the Syrian armed forces and Russian military facilities from the territory of Idlib," said Peskov.

A phone call between the presidents of the two countries has yet to be scheduled, but that one could be arranged within hours, he added.

Commenting on a possible Turkish military operation in Idlib, Peskov said this could either end in a good or bad scenario.

"If we are talking about an operation against terrorist groups in Idlib, this would be in line with the Sochi agreements because it is Turkey's responsibility to neutralize these terrorist groups," he said, adding that an operation against the Syrian Bashar al-Assad regime would represent a "worst-case scenario."

On Wednesday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan told his party's parliamentary group in the capital Ankara that launching Turkey's cross-border operation into Idlib, northwestern Syria, is just "a matter of time".

Meetings with Russian officials on ending the bloodshed in Idlib, a conflict-battered province covered by a nominal cease-fire, have failed to produce results, ending "far from what Turkey wants," said Erdogan.

On Feb. 10 five Turkish troops were martyred and five injured in an attack by Assad regime forces in Idlib, following a similar attack just last week martyring seven soldiers and a civilian contractor working with the Turkish military.

Turkey has since retaliated for both attacks, hitting scores of targets and neutralizing over 200 Assad regime troops.

In September 2018, Turkey and Russia agreed to turn Idlib into a de-escalation zone in which acts of aggression are expressly prohibited.

But more than 1,800 civilians have been killed in attacks by regime and Russian forces since then, flouting both the 2018 cease-fire and a new one that started on Jan. 12.