CEYLANPINAR, Turkey (AP) - The latest on Turkey’s offensive in northern Syria (all times local):
12:50 a.m.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says he rejects a call from U.S. President Donald Trump to declare a ceasefire and halt Turkey’s military offensive in northeastern Syria.
Erdogan said: “They say ’declare a ceasefire.’ We could never declare a ceasefire.”
Turkey’s leader also told a group of journalists Tuesday that he is not concerned about the presence of Syrian government troops moving into the city of Manbij, but does not want Syrian Kurdish fighters to remain.
Turkey launched its military offensive a week ago to clear a border region from Syrian Kurdish forces linked to outlawed Kurdish militants in Turkey. Erdogan said that “we cannot declare a ceasefire until we clear this region.”
Erdogan’s comments during a flight back from Azerbaijan were reported by the Turkish newspaper Hurriyet.
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11:55 p.m.
The Kremlin says Russian President Vladimir Putin has discussed the situation in northern Syria with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The Kremlin says that during Tuesday’s talk the leaders “noted the need to prevent conflicts between Turkish army units and Syrian government forces” and also confirmed their “adherence to Syria’s territorial integrity.”
The Syrian army has moved north under a deal with the Kurds, who have sought protection from the Turkish offensive that followed the withdrawal of U.S. troops from the area. The Russian military has moved in to act as a buffer between the Syrian and Turkish armies.
The Kremlin says Putin warned that the Islamic State militants in Kurdish custody mustn’t be allowed to flee.
It also says Erdogan accepted an invitation to visit Russia “in the nearest days.”
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9:20 p.m.
Russia’s defense minister has had a phone call with his U.S. counterpart to discuss the developments in Syria.
Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu has spoken to U.S. Defense Secretary Mark Esper to discuss “issues of mutual interest in the context of the situation in Syria,” the Russian Defense Ministry said in a terse statement. It didn’t offer any details.
Earlier on Tuesday, the ministry said that Russian military police have deployed to patrol a zone between Turkish forces and the Syrian army around Manbij in Syria’s north. It said it was maintaining close contact with its Turkish counterparts.
The Syrian army took control of Manbij as part of the Kurds’ deal with Damascus to confront the Turkish invasion after the U.S. forces withdrew from northeast Syria.
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7:45 p.m.
Doctors Without Borders says it has decided to suspend the majority of its activities and evacuate its international staff from northeast Syria because of Turkey’s military operation against Kurdish fighters.
The aid organization said Tuesday that the extremely volatile situation has forced the group to evacuate from projects in areas including Ein Issa, Tal Abyad and al-Hol that includes a camp hosting tens of thousands of women and children related to Islamic State group fighters.
It said the “highly unpredictable and fast-changing situation” has made it impossible for the aid organization to negotiate safe access to deliver health care and provide humanitarian assistance to people in distress.
Given the numerous groups fighting on different sides of the conflict, the group said it can no longer guarantee the safety of its Syrian and international staff.
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7:30 p.m.
NATO envoys are set to hold talks Wednesday on the impact of Turkey’s offensive into northern Syria after several allies raised concerns about the actions of the Turkish armed forces.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday that “many NATO Allies have expressed strong criticism” of Turkey, which has the second biggest army in the 29-country alliance after the United States.
Apart from Wednesday’s discussion among NATO ambassadors in Brussels, Stoltenberg also says the issue will be tackled at a meeting of defense ministers at the alliance’s headquarters there next week.
NATO has a system for allies to officially request consultations when they feel their territories may be endangered by the actions of another member.
Many European allies are concerned that imprisoned fighters from the so-called Islamic State group have fled jails during the invasion and could pose a security risk if they return home to Europe.
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6:40 p.m.
French Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian has called for a meeting of the international coalition against the Islamic State group, including the United States and Turkey, to discuss the situation in northeast Syria.
Speaking at the National Assembly, Le Drian said he will travel soon to Iraq to meet with key actors in the region, including Kurdish leaders.
France is still dialoguing with Syria’s Kurds, who were key allies in a U.S.-led coalition against IS, he said.
“There’s some trouble” in the relationship between the European Union and the U.S., Le Drian acknowledged. “That is why the coalition needs to meet.”
He called on both the United States and Turkey to take their responsibilities and tell allies how they intend to keep fighting the IS group
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6:25 p.m.
Hungary’s foreign minister says it is in his country’s interests for Turkey to return migrants to Syria instead of allowing them to make their way to Europe.
Peter Szijjarto told Hungarian state media on Tuesday that Hungary was “looking exclusively at (its) national interests in this matter, not the interests of others.”
Szijjarto added that Hungary’s policy is to help migrants return home “in peaceful, calm and safe circumstances.”
The foreign minister said that Hungary’s position was clear: “Turkey should resettle the migrants in Syria and not open the doors to Europe for four million migrants.”
Last week, Szijjarto acknowledged that Hungary “for a long time” blocked the European Union from issuing a statement warning Turkey that invading Syria could create new waves of refugees.
Szijjarto and Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban were in Baku, the capital of Azerbaijan, attending a meeting of the Turkic Council, which gathers countries like Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Turkey. Hungary, where the council opened an office last year, has observer status.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is scheduled to visit Budapest, the Hungarian capital, on Nov. 7 and met with Orban on the sidelined of the Baku gathering
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6:10 p.m.
U.N. diplomats say the Security Council will hold a closed meeting Wednesday on the situation in northeast Syria following Turkey’s offensive.
Germany requested the meeting on behalf of the five council nations that are members of the European Union, the diplomats said Tuesday, speaking on condition of anonymity because discussions were private. The other EU council members are France, United Kingdom, Belgium and Poland.
The current Security Council president, South Africa’s U.N. Ambassador Jerry Matjila, told reporters that a meeting had been requested and “all council members are very concerned” about the situation on the ground.
“Everybody hopes that … we can do something to bring back the parties to the peace process,” Matjila said.
Kelly Craft, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, told reporters as she headed into the council meeting that the United States is “deeply concerned” that Russian troops are patrolling between Syrian and Turkish troops.
- By Edith M. Lederer.
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5:20 p.m.
Turkey’s Defense Ministry says a soldier who was wounded in a mortar attack carried out from the Kurdish-held town of Manbij has died, raising the death toll in the assault to two.
The ministry said the soldier was among eight troops who were wounded in Tuesday’s attack, which came on the seventh day of Turkey’s incursion into northeastern Syria.
Turkey launched the offensive to drive away Syrian Kurdish fighters it considers as terrorists because of their links to outlawed rebels fighting in Turkey.
The death raises the total number of Turkish soldiers killed the start of the push to six. President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said 16 Turkish-backed Syrian opposition fighters have also died.
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4:40 p.m.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has expressed concern about the effect Turkey’s invasion of northern Syria could have on the fight against the Islamic State group and stability in the region.
Stoltenberg says: “I am concerned about the consequences for … the gains we have made in fighting our common enemy,” the Islamic State group. “And it is extremely important that we preserve those gains.”
He was speaking in London on Tuesday after meeting Prime Minister Boris Johnson to discuss the actions of NATO member Turkey.
Britain and other European nations have suspended arms sales to Ankara following the invasion.
Stoltenberg says the move “reflects that many NATO allies are very critical and are condemning the military operation in northern Syria.”
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3:20 p.m.
A U.S. military spokesman says American troops have left the town of Manbij as part of their withdrawal from northeast Syria.
Col. Myles B. Caggins tweeted: “We are out of Manbij.”
He added that the U.S.-led “coalition forces are executing a deliberate withdrawal from northeast Syria.”
His tweet came hours after Syrian state media reported that government forces have moved into the center of Manbij where they raised the national flag.
The flashpoint area housed U.S. outposts from where they patrolled the region since 2017 to deter a confrontation between Turkey and Kurdish fighters.
Syria’s Kurds have struck a deal with Syrian government forces to fend off the Turkish invasion, as their former ally, the U.S. has ordered a withdrawal from the northern border zone.
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3:00 p.m.
French diplomatic officials say talks between France and the U.S. are focusing on the need to prevent a re-emergence of the Islamic State group amid the violence in Syria.
According to two officials with his office, President Emmanuel Macron spoke with President Donald Trump in a phone call Monday, insisting on the threat posed by Turkey’s offensive in northeast Syria to the whole region and Europe.
The officials say France’s priority is to issue a strong, coordinated diplomatic response in order to put pressure on Turkey so that the country ends its offensive in northern Syria.
The officials spoke Tuesday on condition of anonymity.
Macron also spoke to Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan Monday in a discussion that “underlined the deep divergence of views”, Macron’s office said.
He also called Iraqi President Barham Saleh.
- By Sylvie Corbet
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2:55 p.m.
A Russian envoy for Syria says that Moscow will not allow Turkish and Syrian government forces to clash, underscoring his country’s role as de facto power broker in the conflict amid a U.S. pullout.
Alexander Lavrentyev, presidential envoy for Syria, told Russian state news agencies on Tuesday that “no one is interested” in potential fighting between Syrian government troops and Turkish forces that entered Syria last week. Lavrentyev said Russia “is not going to allow it.”
Lavrentyev also denied reports saying that Moscow has given the green light to Turkey’s operation in Syria and insisted that Russia “has always thought that any military operation in Syria is unacceptable.”
Lavrentyev confirmed that Kurdish leaders and representatives of the Syrian government held talks at a Russian military base last week but said that he was not aware of any results.
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2:30 p.m.
The main Kurdish-led force in Syria says it has lost 23 fighters in clashes with advancing Turkish-led forces over the past day.
The Syrian Democratic Forces says Tuesday that the casualties were inflicted over the past 24 hours in fighting concentrated around Syria’s northern border.
The group’s statement said that the deaths occurred at several flashpoints including Ras al-Ayn where 11 SDF fighters were killed, and seven in Tal Abyad.
The SDF said that 39 of its fighters were also wounded in the fighting.
On Sunday, the group said at least 45 fighters had been killed since the start of Turkey’s invasion into northern Syria, now in its seventh day.
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2:25 p.m.
Britain’s foreign secretary says it has suspended arms sales to Turkey for items that could be used for its ongoing military incursion into Syria.
Dominic Raab told Parliament Tuesday no export licenses for those items will be granted while a “very careful” review of arms sales is conducted.
He says the British government calls on Turkey to “exercise maximum restraint and to bring an end to this unilateral military action.”
Raab criticized Turkey for a “reckless” action that “plays straight into the hands of Russia” and the Syrian government.
Britain’s decision follows similar action taken by other European Union countries.
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2:15 p.m.
Turkey’s defense ministry says a Turkish soldier was killed in a mortar attack on its forces carried out from the Kurdish-held town of Manbij.
The ministry said eight other soldiers were wounded in Tuesday’s attack, which came on the seventh day of a Turkish incursion into northeastern Syria that aims to drive Syrian Kurdish militias away from a border area.
The Turkish military retaliated with an assault that “neutralized” an estimated 15 Syrian Kurdish fighters, the ministry said.
Separately, two people were killed in a new mortar and rocket attack by Syrian Kurdish fighters on a Turkish town bordering Syria, local officials said. The attack on the town of Kiziltepe, Mardin province, also wounded 12 other civilians, the governor’s office said.
Turkish officials say 18 civilians - excluding Tuesday’s victims - have been killed in a barrage of mortar and rocket shells fired on towns located on the Turkish border provinces of Mardin, Sanliurfa, Sirnak and Gaziantep, since the operation began on Oct. 9.
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1:55 p.m.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has renewed a call for Turkey to end its offensive in northern Syria, which she says is harming the fight against the Islamic State group.
Merkel already urged a halt to the military operation in a weekend conversation with Turkey’s president. On Tuesday, she said it should be ended “because it is visibly causing a lot of human suffering and also is bringing a lot of uncertainty with a view to the fight against IS.”
She spoke alongside visiting Norwegian Prime Minister Erna Solberg, who echoed the call for “Turkey to immediately cease the operation and to respect international law.”
Solberg noted that her country has suspended sales of military equipment to NATO ally Turkey, but she added: “I think it’s better to have Turkey inside NATO than outside NATO.” She said it’s best to have Turkey in “our family,” but “we cannot behave as if this had not happened.”
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1:50 p.m.
The U.N. humanitarian aid coordinator says at least 160,000 civilians in northeastern Syria have been displaced amid Turkish-led military operations against Kurdish fighters.
Spokesman Jens Laerke of the Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs says most of the displacement has taken place from the towns of Ras al-Ayn and Tal Abyad, where people are fleeing south.
He said OCHA was especially concerned about some 13,000 people at the Ein Issa displacement camp, near where “hostilities and shelling” took place Monday.
Separately, spokesman Rupert Colville of the U.N. human rights office said it was “not seeing large numbers of civilian casualties” so far - “a few each day” - but people were being killed on both sides of the Syria-Turkey border.
He cautioned: “Obviously we’re not necessarily hearing all cases, either.”
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1:25 p.m.
Turkey’s leader says its troops and allied Syrian opposition forces now hold some 1,000 sq. kilometers of territory in northeast Syria.
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made the comments Tuesday, during a Turkic-speaking nations’ meeting in Baku, Azerbaijan, where he also called for “strong solidarity” from those nations to Turkey’s incursion into Syria, which is now in its seventh day.
The Turkish push has triggered widespread condemnation. The United States called on Turkey to stop the offensive and declare a cease-fire, while European Union countries moved to broaden an arms sale embargo.
Erdogan said that as of Tuesday morning, Turkey had “liberated approximately a 1,000 sq. kilometer area” from Kurdish groups it considers “terrorists” for links to an insurgency within its own borders.
He said the Turkish-led forces aimed to capture a border area in Syria spanning from the city of Manbij to the Iraqi border.
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1:10 p.m.
The Kurdish-led administration in northern Syria says humanitarian conditions are getting worse by the day since Turkey began its invasion last week.
Tuesday’s statement warned that there is lack of much-needed humanitarian assistance after international organizations stopped their activities and withdrew their employees.
The region’s semi-autonomous administration said there is a lack of medical equipment and medicines after “most of the medical centers stopped functioning.”
The administration called on the U.N., Arab League and European Union to “intervene quickly and provide medical, logistical and humanitarian assistance to the displaced to avoid the humanitarian crisis.”
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1:05 p.m.
The U.N. human rights office is urging Turkey to investigate reported cases of “summary executions” that could have been committed by a Turkish-backed armed group in northern Syria.
Rupert Colville, a spokesman for the U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights, on Tuesday cited video footage showing fighters with the Ahrar al-Sharqiya armed group filming themselves capturing and executing three Kurdish captives on a highway in northern Syria on Saturday.
He cited reports of another alleged summary execution of a Kurdish woman politician on the same road, also on Saturday.
Colville told reporters in Geneva that Turkey “could be deemed responsible” for violations committed by armed groups over which it has “effective control” or the group’s operations during which the violations occurred.
He said the videos were widely circulated on social media.
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12:50 p.m.
Syrian state media says government forces have entered the center of the once Kurdish-held northern town of Manbij and raised the national flag.
A video released by SANA showed some people gathered in the main square waving Syrian flags Tuesday morning.
Syrian President Bashar Assad’s forces had left the area at the height of the civil war, leaving it to the Kurdish groups.
The flashpoint area housed U.S. troops who patrolled the region since 2017 to deter a confrontation between Turkey and Kurdish fighters.
The Kurdish Hawar News Agency said American troops left the town on Tuesday morning moving west toward the Tishrin Dam on the Euphrates.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan signaled on Monday that his military was ready to begin the assault Manbij.
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12:30 p.m.
Italy’s foreign minister says that his country will examine all existing arms contracts with Turkey to see if they can be legally cancelled.
Luigi Di Maio told lawmakers on Tuesday that Italy will block all future arms exports to Turkey, as agreed the previous day by a summit of EU foreign ministers condemning Turkey’s military offensive in northern Syria.
Di Maio called on Turkey to “immediately suspend all military operations in Syria,” saying it alone was responsible for the aggression and that they only way to resolve the Syrian crisis is through diplomacy.
Turkey has defied widespread opposition from its NATO allies and pressed on with its military operation against Kurdish groups in Syria, now in its seventh day.
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10:30 a.m.
Turkish artillery is pounding suspected Syrian Kurdish positions near a town in northeast Syria as Turkey’s military incursion enters its seventh day.
An Associated Press journalist on Tuesday reported heavy bombardment of targets in the countryside of Ras al Ayn, days after Turkey announced that it had captured the border town. Turkish jets also carried out at least one airstrike.
The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, a war monitor, reported Kurdish fighters had retaken the town.
A Turkish military official denied reports that Turkey had begun an assault on the Kurdish-held town of Manbij, without giving further detail.
Meanwhile, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan defended Turkey’s offensive in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, calling on the international community to support the initiative or “begin admitting refugees” from Syria.
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