The US has urged Turkey to use restraint in its ongoing military operation in northern Syria as Turkish ground forces pressed ahead against the Syrian Kurdish group YPG in the enclave of Afrin.
Washington considers the YPG its closest ally in Syria, viewing it as the most effective ground force in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) group.
Heather Nauert, spokeswoman for the US State Department, said on Sunday that Secretary of State Rex Tillerson spoke with his Turkish and Russian counterparts on the phone and called against an escalation in fighting in northern Syria.
“We urge Turkey to exercise restraint and ensure that its military operations remain limited in scope and duration and scrupulous to avoid civilian casualties,” said Nauert.
According to Al Jazeera, the statement on Sunday came just hours after Turkey said its ground troops had crossed into northern Syria.
Ankara considers Syria’s Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) and its armed wing, the YPG, “terrorist groups” with ties to the banned Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), which has waged a decades-long fight inside Turkey.
