Tue 11 February 2020:
Turkey on Wednesday will announce a series of new steps it will take against the recent Assad regime attacks on Turkish soldiers in northwestern Syria’s Idlib province, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said Tuesday.
Speaking at an award ceremony at Beştepe National Congress and Culture Center in Ankara, the president said the Assad regime will pay a heavy price for targeting Turkish troops in Idlib as part of an agreement.
“We have given the necessary response and retaliated in kind but this is not enough,” Erdoğan said, adding that he will share the details of the steps on Wednesday.
The Turkish military and the Syrian National Army (SNA) launched an operation in Idlib as the number of Turkish casualties rose to 13 in attacks launched by the Bashar Assad regime on Monday.
Ankara and Moscow agreed last year in Sochi to stop acts of aggression and turn Idlib into a de-escalation zone, which was to be monitored by 12 Turkish observation points.
However, the regime, Iran-backed militia groups and Russia have consistently violated the cease-fire, launching frequent attacks inside the de-escalation zone. Three observation points in the region – point seven, eight, and nine – are currently under siege by regime forces.
Syrian regime forces have continued to pound Idlib as part of an offensive that has killed 300 civilians since December and displaced 520,000 people.
More than 1.5 million Syrians have moved near the Turkish border due to intense attacks over the past year.
Turkey remains the country with the most refugees in the world, hosting more than 3.7 million migrants since the start of the Syrian Civil War.
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