Turkey's aim to clear Syria of terrorism

By Ilkay Guder

ANKARA

Turkey’s military role in Syria is to rid the country of terrorism, presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin said Tuesday, adding that it had no other plans in Syria or Iraq.

In an interview with Haber Turk TV, Kalin said Turkey supported the expected operation to clear Daesh from Raqqah, the terror group’s de facto capital in Syria.

However, he stressed that Turkey could not fight alongside the PKK/PYD or its military wing, the YPG.

“Let's do it together, with the international coalition, we have no objection to this,” he said. “However, it seems that the Americans again are preparing this operation by conducting their ‘We need to do it with the YPG’ thesis. And we said ‘If the YPG is included, our involvement in the operation is out of question.”

Turning to Palestine, Kalin reiterated Ankara’s support for Gaza despite normalizing ties with Israel earlier this year.

He said the government had recently sent a delegation from the Energy Ministry to help resolve Gaza’s long-standing power crisis and stressed that the Turkish support for Palestinian independence “is the same” as it has always been.