Syria’s official news agency SANA reported that Turkish troops and their proxies attacked residential neighborhoods in Ayn Issa, located around 45 kilometers north of the provincial capital city of Raqqah, with artillery rounds, rockets and mortar shells on Saturday, causing heavy damage to citizens’ properties, public facilities as well as urban infrastructure. There were no immediate reports of possible casualties. Iran News quotes the news.

The report added that local residents fled the town fearing for their lives.

The so-called Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, meanwhile, reported that the Kurdish-led SDF militants, whose ranks mainly include YPG fighters, “are trying to prevent Turkish forces and their Syrian proxies from advancing towards the town.”

Elsewhere in Syria’s northeastern province of Hasakah, local sources, requesting anonymity, have told SANA that Turkish military forces are apparently establishing a new base on the outskirts of Ra’s al-Ayn city.

The sources noted that Turkish military engineering vehicles are flattening the terrain, and setting up bulwarks.

Local sources also said tens of families, dressed in outfits similar to members of the Daesh terrorist group, have settled in the southern sector of Ra’s al-Ayn.

On October 9, Turkish military forces and Ankara-backed militants launched a long-threatened cross-border invasion of northeastern Syria in a declared attempt to push YPG militants away from border areas

Ankara views the US-backed YPG as a terrorist organization tied to the homegrown Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has been seeking an autonomous Kurdish region in Turkey since 1984.

On October 22, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan signed a memorandum of understanding that asserted YPG militants had to withdraw from the Turkish-controlled “safe zone” in northeastern Syria within 150 hours, after which Ankara and Moscow would run joint patrols around the area.

In the wake of the flare-up, Syria deployed unit of its army to areas in the northeast following a deal with Kurds to hand over control of key cities in the region to government forces in exchange for support against Turkish strikes.

Ankara wants to see a 32-kilometer “safe zone” established in northeastern Syria which is clear from Kurdish militants and where it can relocate a great percentage of the more than three million Syrian refugees living in Turkey.

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TEHRAN (Iran News) – The UN General Assembly reaffirmed by an overwhelming majority Syria’s sovereignty over the occupied Golan and over its resources, demanding that Israeli regime cease exploiting, damaging, squandering, depleting, or endangering its natural resources.

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In a statement on Tuesday, the Iranian Foreign Ministry reacted to the latest Turkish Military Operation in Syria and the alleged army’s plan to attack the Arab country.

The statement denounced the “illegitimate” presence of American military forces in Syria, saying Washington’s decision to pull the US forces out of Syria and end the occupation of Syrian territories should have been made much earlier.

The Foreign Ministry also expressed hope that the US move would result in the establishment of peace and stability in Syria and in the region.

The statement further noted that Tehran was closely monitoring the “worrying reports” about the possibility of Turkish military forces entering the Syrian territories, warning that such a measure would not only not alleviate Turkey’s security concerns, but also bring about widespread financial and humanitarian losses.

“Accordingly, the Islamic Republic of Iran is opposed to any possible military operation” in Syria, the statement added.

The ministry also voiced Tehran’s readiness to make immediate contacts with the Turkish and Syrian officials in order to address the existing concerns in a peaceful manner, stressing that “respect for Syria’s national sovereignty and territorial integrity as well as the Adana agreement” would be the appropriate basis for the negotiations.

Turkey seeks to establish a 32-kilometer “safe zone” in northern Syria, and has stressed that it wants the Kurdish-led militants known as the People’s Protection Units (YPG) cleared from the region.

Neither Turkey nor the US has authorization from the Syrian government for their activities in the Arab country.

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