Ankara coordinates its actions in the Syrian province of Idlib with Moscow in order to ensure security in the region, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said on Sunday.
“We will ensure security in Idlib, and we are working with Russia on this issue,” Yildirim said, as quoted by the NTV broadcaster, Sputnik reported.
On Saturday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced plans to deploy the country’s soldiers to Syria’s Idlib, where the Free Syrian Army rebel fighters backed by Ankara have launched an operation.
He also said that Russia has agreed to provide air support to the operation; however, there has been no official comment by the Russian Defense Ministry yet supporting the claim. Nevertheless, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said earlier this week that Russia is ready to support armed groups fighting al-Nusra Front in Syria’s Idlib de-escalation zone.
Currently, Idlib is mostly controlled by Tahrir al-Sham, a militant group led by al-Nusra Front terrorist group, al-Qaeda’s former Syrian affiliate. The group is not party to the agreement on setting up a de-escalation zone in Idlib agreed upon during the Syrian peace talks in Astana brokered by Russia, Iran and Turkey.
Meanwhile, Syria’s army and its allies have encircled the self-styled Islamic State terrorist group in the city of al-Mayadin, southeast of Deir al-Zor, in eastern Syria, a Syrian military source said on Sunday, Reuters reported.
Al-Mayadin is one of the last strongholds of IS as it falls back upon the fertile area downstream of Deir al-Zor in the Euphrates valley and launches counter attacks in the central desert after losing swathes of territory this year.
“Units of our armed forces with the allied forces continue their advance on a number of fronts and axes in Deir al-Zor and its countryside… and encircle Daesh terrorists in the city of al-Mayadin,” the military source said, using an Arabic acronym for IS.
The army and its allies reached Deir al-Zor in September after a months-long offensive across the Syria desert, and have in recent weeks pushed down the Euphrates towards al-Mayadin.
However, counter attacks by IS in the central desert region have put pressure on the main supply road to Deir al-Zor from western Syria.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is backed in the war by Russia, Iran and militias including Lebanon’s Hezbollah, and its campaign against IS has mostly been on the west bank of the river.
A US-led coalition is also supporting a rival campaign against the militants, mostly on the east bank, where it is close to recapturing Raqqa, and has also advanced downstream to hold areas opposite Deir al-Zor.
US officials have previously said that IS had relocated some of its diminished command and propaganda structures to al-Mayadin as it was forced from territory elsewhere.