Reporting live from Ankara, where dreams come true and refrigerators become fishing boats.
In this week’s recap:
Turkey weighs options in Syria
DEM delegation to meet Erdoğan
CHP resumes congress trial Friday
Domestic and diplomatic wraps
Tolstoy relative tours Istanbul dungeon
Also from us this week:
Soner Çağaptay on how Gaza peace efforts are spotlighting US-Turkey ties
Johanna Sagmeister on the queer community’s reaction to the anti-LGBTQ draft law
Next week: Fiona Mullen, director of Sapienta Economics, joins our podcast to discuss the significance of the North Cyprus elections.
Watch the livestream here Oct. 27 at 0900 UTC / 1100 TRT.
Syrian intervention is the topic in Ankara this week. If not through Turkish military operations, then indirectly through arms deliveries to the Syrian national army, as reported by Bloomberg Friday.
The news was followed with a vote in Turkish parliament Tuesday to extend the mandate for Turkish troop deployments in Syria, Iraq and Lebanon by three years, citing ongoing terror threats posed by PKK-aligned groups and the Islamic State.
Taken together, the developments have raised new questions about Ankara’s commitment to the PKK peace process (more below) and its position on reportedly stagnating integration efforts between the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the central government.
Who said what: The clearest inquiry came from CHP MP Namık Tan, who in the grand assembly Tuesday asked:
“If the [Turkish Armed Forces] continue military operations and open-ended deployments in Iraq and Syria, what purpose does the [parliamentary peace] commission have in going to the island?”, referring to Imralı island, where imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan is conducting peace negotiations.
In presser Monday, DEM Party parliamentary group deputy chair Gülistan Kılıç Koçyiğit also voiced opposition to extending cross-border military mandates:
“We all see that to this day, neither the motions for war nor the security-oriented policies have been able to solve Turkey’s problems or regional problems. On the contrary, they have deepened the problems and even dragged the region into a great spiral of chaos and violence.”
Who supports what: Like most Syrian citizens, most nations want stability in Syria. To help achieve that and facilitate economic development, the UK Tuesday removed its terror group designation for Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), the group led by Syrian Pres. Ahmed al-Sharaa.
This follows a similar move by Washington in July. US Special Envoy Thomas Barrack continues to work to repeal sanctions on Syria under the Caesar Act, which was suspended for 180 days in May. Barrack also frequently promotes US-Syria coordination, writing on X Sunday: “Syria is back to our side.”
Meanwhile, Ankara officials tie Turkey’s security interests to Syria, reiterating this position in frequent contacts between Turkish FM Hakan Fidan and his Syrian counterpart Asaad al-Shaibani.
In this respect, officials on both sides of the border are increasingly pointing to an end-of-year deadline to implement the March 10 agreement between the SDF with the Damascus government.
Analysis: The problem with the March 10 agreement is that it’s not really an agreement but rather an agreement to discuss areas of possible agreement.
Aron Lund, a fellow at Century International, said such a task may prove difficult for the HTS and SDF, who both made it through a civil war by consolidating power – not sharing it.
“They’re fundamentally ideologically incompatible,” Lund said of the HTS and SDF. “And I think they’re both pragmatic about getting to where they want to be. It’s just that what they want is to retain their power. And you can’t really square that circle through compromise.”
“I think … the likely outcome is that one side will be more powerful, and the other will end up getting purged as the weaker party,” he added, referring to a deal on the integration of Syrian regions.
Regarding the view from Ankara, Lund said it’s likely Turkish officials will grow less patient as the agreement deadline and one-year anniversary of regime change approach. Still, he believes Turkey’s course of action will depend on US policy in Syria.
“Turkey is using this [end-of-year] deadline and putting pressure on the SDF and thereby implicitly also on the Americans,” Lund told Turkey recap. “That’s probably something that’s intended to sort of hasten an American reaction to this, and Erdoğan seems to have a good thing going with Trump at the moment.”
On the prospects of Turkish intervention in Syria, Lund deferred to nuance:
“I think it’s unhelpful to think about it in binary terms on whether Turkey will or won’t invade. There’s a lot of gray space in which they could do things to pressure the SDF and sort of escalate tensions without sending a division of Turkish troops across the border.”
Cheery bond: DEM delegation to meet Erdoğan
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