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Their future intertwined, Türkiye and Syria weigh further cooperation in the post-Assad era, amid concerns regarding the U.S.-backed terrorist group YPG.
Sources from the Defense Ministry on Thursday said Ankara would continue supporting Syria’s political unity and territorial integrity and, to that extent, would provide training and technical support upon request by the Syrian administration, to enhance their capacity for the fight against terrorist groups. Sources said Türkiye was closely monitoring the integration of the PKK terrorist group’s Syrian wing, YPG, into the Syrian army “in the field.”
The new Syrian government has been working to reestablish order nationwide since the ouster of former regime leader Bashar Assad on Dec. 8, 2024.
Ankara, which has cordial ties with the new government, has repeatedly offered Damascus its operational and military support to fight Daesh and other terrorist threats.
Daesh seized large swathes of Syrian and Iraqi territory in the early years of the civil war, declaring a cross-border “caliphate” in 2014 before being territorially defeated in 2019. The terrorist group has since shifted to “studied attacks on strategic targets” in Syria and maintains sleeper cells across northeastern regions.
In May, Syrian security services uncovered more Daesh cells in rural Damascus, a week before the terrorists carried out a suicide attack in a church, killing at least 20 people.
President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has vowed Türkiye would “not allow terrorists to drag Syria back into chaos and instability.”
Also in collaboration with Jordan and Iraq, Türkiye and Syria have activated the Counter-Daesh Coordination Cell, Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan announced last month. He said the joint mechanism’s effective fight against Daesh would mean the West will no longer need to rely on YPG terrorists to fight Daesh.
Defense Ministry sources said Türkiye was expecting the integration of the YPG into the Syrian army by the end of this year, per a deal between Damascus and the YPG.
Fight against PKK
As it expects the YPG to join the Syrian army, Türkiye at the same time monitors the disarmament of its parent terrorist group, the PKK. Defense Ministry spokesperson Zeki Aktürk told a news briefing on Thursday that within the past week, four PKK members turned themselves into security forces after fleeing Iraq’s north, where the group has hideouts.
Aktürk said security forces also destroyed tunnels stretching for a total distance of 517 kilometers (321 miles) in Syria’s north so far, in Tal Rifaat and Manbij, which were liberated from YPG control after the fall of the Assad regime. A complex network of tunnels under two towns has been used both as bases for the YPG and as a means of escape in case of raids.
The terror-free Türkiye initiative launched by Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli had its first tangible progress in February when PKK jailed ringleader Abdullah Öcalan accepted Bahçeli’s call and urged the group to lay down arms. In May, the PKK announced it would dissolve itself.
Earlier this month, some 30 PKK members, including a senior leader, burned their weapons in a ceremony in northern Iraq. Although symbolic, the gesture marked the first time that the group practically laid down arms in its campaign of violence for more than four decades. The PKK has previously announced so-called unilateral truces but has never entirely given up its ambitions.
