US: Turkey needs Baghdad’s approval for operations in Iraq

WASHINGTON DC, United States (Kurdistan 24) – “Any operations in Iraq that Turkey might carry out should be done with the approval of the Iraqi government,” State Department Spokesperson Heather Nauert said on Thursday as she responded to a question from Kurdistan 24.

Turkey has repeatedly threatened to attack Sinjar [Shingal], where it claims the PKK (Kurdistan Workers’ Party) is still present. Most recently, on Wednesday, Turkey again threatened military action amid conflicting reports about the situation there.

On Friday, the PKK had announced it was leaving Shingal. Then, on Tuesday, Iraqi forces reportedly entered the area. On Wednesday, Qasim Shesho, a legendary Ezidi commander with the Peshmerga, said that PKK-affiliated groups remained in Shingal, in coordination with Iraq’s Shia militias.

“More than 1,000 armed groups remain in [Shingal],” he explained.

Asked to clarify the conflicting accounts, Nauert said only, “We’ve seen reports of those groups in [Shingal],” as she expressed sympathy with the Ezidis who were “brutally murdered” by the Islamic State (IS).

Paul Davis, a former Pentagon analyst on Kurdish affairs, suggested to Kurdistan 24 that the PKK had departed, but it had turned over control to its Ezidi affiliates.

Even sharper tensions persist over Manbij. On Thursday, French President Emmanuel Macron met with a delegation of Syrian Kurds, including representatives from the People’s Protection Units (YPG) that form the backbone of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), the main partner of the anti-IS Coalition in Syria.

Ankara maintains that the YPG is merely an extension of the PKK.

After the meeting, a spokesman for the YPG’s political arm said Macron had promised to send French troops to Manbij, although Macron’s office would only say that the French President had “assured the SDF of France's support for stabilizing the security zone in the northeast of Syria, within the framework of an inclusive and balanced governance” to prevent IS’ re-emergence.

Talks between the US and Turkey, within the framework established by outgoing Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, when he visited Ankara in February, are set to resume in Washington.

On March 30, Umit Yalcin, Turkey’s Undersecretary of State for Foreign Affairs, will meet with Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan. Amberin Zaman, writing in al-Monitor, reported that Turkish officials are “cautiously optimistic” that Yalcin’s trip will pave the way for a visit to Washington by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu to conclude an understanding on Manbij.

US officials, however, were tight-lipped in advance of the sensitive discussions.

On Syria more broadly, Nauert distanced the State Department from President Donald Trump’s surprise statement earlier on Thursday, when he said the US would be leaving Syria “very soon.”

Speaking in the “Rust Belt” state of Ohio about rebuilding American infrastructure, Trump stated, “We’ll be coming out of Syria, like, very soon,” as he boasted of US success in defeating IS.

“Let the other people take care of [Syria] now,” Trump said.

Asked if she was aware of any decision to pull out of Syria, Nauert replied, “I am not, no.”

Davis suggested to Kurdistan 24 that Trump sometimes speaks off the cuff, but his remarks do not translate into policy, with the result that those who do not recognize his unconventional way of speaking can end up very surprised.

A recent example is the telephone conversation Trump had with Russian President Vladimir Putin on March 20.

British officials had determined that Russia was behind the attempted assassination, on March 4, of a former Russian spy with a sophisticated nerve agent. London was in the process of trying to mobilize strong international support for punitive measures against Moscow.

Despite his advisers’ counsel, Trump failed to mention the incident in his discussion with Putin, which, by all accounts, was quite cordial.

However, six days later, the Trump administration announced it was ordering 60 Russian spies operating under diplomatic cover to leave the country—the largest such set of expulsions in the history of US-Russian relations.

Editing by Nadia Riva