Turkish Forum

Tag: no-fly zone

  • Turkey: Planned NATO missiles won’t be used to establish Syria no-fly zone

    Turkey: Planned NATO missiles won’t be used to establish Syria no-fly zone

    Turkey riles Syria, Russia and Iran by requesting NATO surface-to-air Patriot system, designed to intercept aircraft or missiles after weeks of talks on how to secure its border.

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    A Turkish soldier taking up a position as gunfire is heard in the northern Syrian town of Ras al-Ain, at the Turkish border town of Ceylanpinar, Sanliurfa province, November 25, 2012. Photo by Reuters

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    Reuters

    NATO surface-to-air missiles due to be stationed near Turkey’s border with Syria will only be used to protect Turkish territory and not to establish a no-fly zone within Syria, the Turkish military said on Monday.

    Turkey riled Syria, Russia and Iran by requesting the NATO surface-to-air Patriot system, designed to intercept aircraft or missiles, last Wednesday after weeks of talks on how to shore up security on its 900-km border as the conflict in Syria deepens.

    Syria, which called the move “provocative”, and its allies including Russia and Iran oppose any development that they perceive could be a first step towards implementing a no-fly zone.

    “The deployment of the air and missile defense system is only to counter an air or missile threat originating in Syria and is a measure entirely aimed at defense,” the Turkish military said in a statement.

    “That it will be used to form a no-fly zone or for an offensive operation is out of the question,” it said.

    Syrian rebels, despite seizing swathes of land, are almost defenseless against Syria’s air force and have called for an internationally enforced no-fly zone, a measure that helped Libyan rebels overthrow Muammar Gaddafi last year.

    On Monday, Syrian jets bombed the rebels’ headquarters near the border, opposition activists in the area said.

    Most foreign governments are loath to impose a no-fly zone for fear of getting dragged into the 20-month-old conflict.

    A joint Turkish-NATO team will start work on Tuesday assessing where to station the missiles, how many would be needed and the number of foreign troops that would be sent to operate them, the statement said.

    Within NATO, only the United States, the Netherlands and Germany possess Patriot missiles. The Netherlands has sent Patriots to Turkey twice before during both Gulf wars in 1991 and 2003.

    Turkey is reluctant to be drawn into the fighting, but the proximity of Syrian bombing raids to its border is straining its nerves. It has repeatedly scrambled fighter jets along the frontier and responded in kind to stray Syrian shells that have crossed into its territory.

    Turkey – a major backer of Syria’s opposition – is worried about its neighbor’s chemical weapons, the refugee crisis on its border, and what it says is Syrian support for Kurdish militants on its own soil.

    via Turkey: Planned NATO missiles won’t be used to establish Syria no-fly zone – Israel News | Haaretz Daily Newspaper.

  • Turkey and US ‘discuss no-fly zone’ for Syria

    Turkey and US ‘discuss no-fly zone’ for Syria

    Zoi Constantine

    Jan 13, 2012

    BEIRUT // Nato members and some Gulf states are discussing possible military intervention in Syria, according to a senior Russian security official.

    Nikolai Patrushev, head of the Security Council of Russia, said the United States and Turkey, both Nato members, were discussing the possibility of a no-fly zone.

    “Working under the ‘Libyan scenario’, they intend to move from indirect intervention in Syria to direct military intervention,” said Mr Patrushev, former head of the FSB, the intelligence agency that succeeded the Soviet-era KGB.

    There has been speculation that the crisis in Syria might follow a trajectory similar to the uprising in Libya, where a Nato-imposed no-fly zone and bombing campaign helped to topple Muammar Qaddafi.

    Some Syrian opposition groups, including the Free Syrian Army, have been calling for a no-fly zone and buffer zones to assist the 10-month revolt against the regime of the Syrian president, Bashar Al Assad. Russia is expected to oppose any Nato role.

    The Arab League has taken the lead in attempts to end the violence in which the United Nations estimates more than 5,000 people have died. The Syrian government says 2,000 soldiers and police have been killed since the uprising began in March.

    An observer mission sent to Syria by the 22-member league to monitor its peace plan has been heavily criticised.

    Anwar Malek, a league monitor from Algeria, quit on Wednesday and says three more of his colleagues have done the same. His claim could not be independently verified.

    “We were giving them cover to carry out the most repugnant actions, worse than what was taking place before the monitors came,” Mr Malek said yesterday.

    Mr Malek, who is now in Qatar, claims some monitors have been reporting to their own governments instead of to the Arab League.

    An unnamed official at the Arab League dismissed the accusations, and said Mr Malek had been bedridden and was never in the field.

    More than 400 people have been killed since the first monitors arrived on December 26, the UN says. At least 21 were killed yesterday, according to the Local Coordination Committees, a Syrian opposition group that documents the uprising and plans events on the ground.

    Speaking in Abu Dhabi yesterday, Radwan Bin Khadra, an adviser to the Arab League secretary-general and head of its legal department, said he could not be sure no other observers would follow Mr Malek’s lead.

    “We hope the mission continues and brings about results and that there is co-operation with them.”

    He said the observers were scheduled to stay in the country until there was an end to the bloodshed, with political stability and a political solution. “The escalation of events is saddening,” he said.

    Gerard Peytrignet, head of the International Committee of the Red Cross’s regional delegation in Kuwait, said ambulances were being prevented from reaching wounded civilians.

    “We do not participate in fights, we have to be respected in all circumstances, we are not there to take sides, just help,” he said.

    Meanwhile questions remain about who was behind a mortar attack in Homs on Wednesday that left at least eight people dead, including a French journalist, Gilles Jacquier, who was on a government-organised visit to the city.

    The French government has called for an investigation into the bombing.

    The state-run Syrian news agency, Sana, said the attack was carried out by an “armed terrorist group”. Some opposition groups have blamed the government.

    The president, Mr Al Assad, has continued to maintain that foreign-backed extremist groups are behind the escalating violence.

    zconstantine@thenational.ae

    * With additional reporting by Ola Salem in Abu Dhabi, Bloomberg and Reuters

    via Turkey and US ‘discuss no-fly zone’ for Syria – The National.