BALADI NEWS
U.S. troops and an allied Kurdish militia conducted a joint patrol Wednesday in a town on the border with Turkey, a Kurdish news agency and a Syria war monitor reported.
The move appeared to be part of an agreement to set up a safe zone along Syria’s northeast border.
Turkey sees the Syrian Kurdish fighters, who make up the majority of the Syrian Democratic Forces militia (SDF) and are allied with the U.S., as terrorists aligned with a Kurdish insurgency within Turkey.
Turkey has been pressing for a safe zone to ensure security on its border running east of the Euphrates River toward the Iraqi border. Turkey wants to control — in coordination with the U.S. — a 19-25 mile (30-40 kilometer) deep zone within civil war-ravaged Syria.
The patrol occurred near the town of Ras al-Ein and consisted of U.S. troops and members of the Ras al-Ein Military Council, according to the Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights and the Kurdish ANHA news agency. ANHA aired a video of the joint patrol that included armored vehicles raising American flags accompanied by allied militia members in pickup trucks.
The Ras al-EIn Military Council is purportedly a local force separate from the SDF but Turkey will likely see it as being under SDF influence.
Turkey wants the region along its border to be clear of Syrian Kurdish forces and has threatened on numerous occasions to launch a new operation in Syria against Syrian Kurdish forces if such a zone is not established.
Source: Military Times.