* Photo: Fatih Aktaş - Ankara / AA
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After President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and US Vice President Mike Pence met yesterday evening (October 17), Minister of Foreign Affairs Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu has addressed the reporters at the Presidency in Ankara.
Referring to a safe zone to be established in northern Syria, Minister Çavuşoğlu has not specified which territories occupied by Syria and Russia will be a part of the safe zone:
"Our aim was to clear the terrorists from the region. In today's negotiations, we have got what we wanted thanks to the astute leadership of our Dear President. The US side, as part of protection of Turkey's legitimate security interests, acknowledged the importance and functionality of safe zone.
"It has been fully agreed that the safe zone will be under the control of the Turkish Armed Forces, which means that the US has accepted the aims and legitimacy of our operation and aims."
Çavuşoğlu has also said, "Today, we have once again affirmed and emphasized our commitment to the protection of Syria's territorial integrity and the political process based on UN Security Council Resolution 2254."
'Current sanctions will be lifted'
While US Vice President Pence referred to the US-Turkey agreement in northeast Syria as a "ceasefire", Minister Çavuşoğlu has argued that it is a pause of the operation, not a ceasefire:
"We will pause the Operation Peace Spring so that the PKK/YPG will leave the safe zone within 120 hours. We will not halt [the operation], but pause it. It is not a ceasefire. Ceasefire only happens between two legitimate sides. We are just pausing the operation so that the terrorists, who were the target of the operation in the first place, will leave the safe zone.
"We can halt the operation only after the terrorist elements completely leave the safe zone. We will end the operation only after terrorists elements leave.
"When we pause the operation, the US side will stop the sanctions. And, afterwards, we will only stop the operation when the indicated conditions are met, I mean, after the YPG elements leave within 120 hours. The current sanctions will be lifted after this stage."
Çavuşoğlu has underlined that "pausing the operation does not mean that Turkey will withdraw its soldiers and forces from the region".
"We will be there, we will continue being there", he has indicated and added, "We will personally follow what is done and what is not done with both our presence there and our sources of intelligence."
Erdoğan invited to Sochi
Çavuşoğlu has reiterated that they are aware of the presence of Syrian soldiers in some regions of northern Syria including Manbij as well as in the east of Euphrates close to Syria-Turkey border.
"As of yesterday, forces of the regime and Russia also entered Ayn al-Arab-Kobani region. Therefore, with whom will we discuss Manbij and some other regions? With Russia", Çavuşoğlu has said.
Concluding his remarks, Çavuşoğlu has announced that President of Russia Vladimir Putin invited President Erdoğan to Sochi to discuss the next steps to be taken by Turkey in Syria:
"The aspect of security is important, but it also has a humanitarian side to it, the return of the refugees... We are talking about a 20 mile/32 km-deep safe zone along the 444 km border. We are discussing some part of it with the US. We will discuss Manbij and some parts of its with Russia and, in the upcoming period, we will take the necessary steps to ensure that the entire region will be turned into a safe zone."
Minister of Foreign Affairs Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu previously spoke to Zeinab Badawi from the BBC HARDTalk about the Operation Peace Spring.
"Russia is conveying messages between Damascus and Ankara. If Russia removes the YPG elements from the region in company with Syrian army, we will not object", Çavuşoğlu told Badawi. (AS/SD)
