France has proposed to launch an attack on Syria’s Raqqa which is the so called “capital” of Daesh. In the operation to liberate Raqqa, West plans to use the support of the Kurdish militia, which has at present occupied the highway that connects Mosul with Raqqa, thereby cutting off the main route of movement of militants between the two main cities, controlled by Daesh.
The involvement of Kurdish militia in the operation has resulted in protests from Ankara which against the background of improvement in Russian-Turkish relations is thinking about joint coordination of actions in the neighboring Arab countries together with Moscow and Damascus.
“The US is providing the Kurdish People's Protection Units with all kind of support — military, technical, material and psychological,” the brigadier said.
He further said that there is a military-political alliance between the US military and the Kurdish militia.
“Turkey however, opposes the involvement of People's Protection Units but all of its claims in this regard are strictly rejected by the United States,” Solmaztürk said.
According to the former brigadier the Turkish concerns are understandable because Ankara does not want to see the formation of Syrian Kurdish autonomous federal and a more independent Kurdish state.
“Turkey is convinced that Kurdish self-defense forces are directly linked to the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) in Turkey.”
“The Turkish-American cooperation in Syria is almost non-existent; on the contrary it has all the conditions for a conflict,” Solmaztürk said.
Talking about the solution to the Syrian crisis, the General said that, “Meanwhile, a way out of the current deadlock in Syria lies in tripartite cooperation between Ankara, Damascus and Moscow.”
According to him, currently Turkey is trying to do something in Syria and Iraq by itself. However, such unilateral attempts only complicate an already difficult situation in Syria.
“It is in Turkish interests to cooperate with Russia and establish contact with Damascus,” the former brigadier said.
