Kurds hit Turkey-backed rebels in Afrin’s countryside
ERBIL (Kurdistan 24) – The People’s Protection Units (YPG) on Sunday said they hit two rebel groups allied to Turkey in the countryside of Afrin.
The YPG claimed responsibility for the attacks one week after they made clear any other group carrying assaults on Turkish-backed forces in Afrin are not affiliated to the Kurdish forces.
The two separate military operations against militias allied with Turkey were in Afrin’s Mabata and Bulbul districts.
The first, an ambush on Aug. 19 on the road leading to the Mabata district, killed one of the mercenaries of the Levant Front (Jabhat al-Shamiya), Muhammad Arduan.
The second operation was on Aug. 24 where the Kurdish forces killed a member of the Faylaq al-Sham group, Abu Muhammad al-Shamali, who was responsible for setting up checkpoints in the Bulbul district.
Last week, the YPG’s Press Office denied involvement in attacks by other groups in Afrin, blaming the Turkish intelligence instead.
“Various armed groups operating under different names are conducting military operations in Afrin and promoting their actions on social media and websites,” the statement said.
“The methods applied in these types of attacks” link some of these groups “to Turkish secret services,” it added.
“For these reasons, we confirm the right of the people of Afrin and our [YPG] fighters to carry out military operations by legitimate means to expel the Turkish occupation and its mercenaries from our territory.”
Other groups apart from the YPG have also carried out attacks on Turkish-backed forces in Afrin.
On Sunday, the mysterious Afrin’s Revenge Falcons Military Group said they had assassinated Mohammed Ahmed Moussa, a Kurd, who was allegedly a guide for Turkish forces.
Turkish-backed Islamist militias and the Turkish army took over Afrin from the YPG earlier this year in a battle that lasted over two months, displaced over 137,000 civilians, and evicted the local Kurdish-led administration in the region.
Editing by Karzan Sulaivany