Turkish military convoy hit by airstrike in northern Syria
By: Kareen Fahim - Washington Post - 8-19-19
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Smoke billows above buildings during a reported air strike by pro-regime forces on the town of Hish in Syria's Idlib province on Aug. 19, 2019. (Omar Haj Kadour/AFP/Getty Images)
ISTANBUL — A Turkish military convoy was targeted by an airstrike in Syria on Monday, killing three civilians, Turkey’s Defense Ministry said in a statement.
Syria’s government said the convoy contained weapons bound for insurgents, without saying whether it was behind the strike, which took place in Idlib province.
The attack threatens to imperil the fragile military cooperation between Russia and Turkey in northern Syria, including agreements aimed at decreasing violence there.
While Turkey has been able to maintain observation posts in Idlib, its cooperation with Russia has not prevented the government of President Bashar al-Assad, Russia’s ally, from pursuing an all-out offensive to recapture the province from Syrian rebel groups.
Turkey did not say who conducted the airstrike but at least partially blamed Russia.
The Russian government had been supplied with “advance information” about the convoy’s route, the ministry said. The attack “contradicts the existing agreements, cooperation and dialogue with the Russian Federation,” it added, calling for “all necessary measures to be taken to prevent recurrence of such incidents.”
Turkey maintained its right to respond in self-defense, the statement said. The convoy had set out for the Turkish observation post at 5:30 a.m. on Monday, and was attacked from the air shortly before 9 a.m. In addition to the three fatalities, 12 other civilians were wounded.
Syria’s government said in a statement of its own that the convoy had been loaded with “ammunition, weapons and material” intended for a Syrian jihadist group in Khan Sheikhoun, a target of the government offensive and one of the last major rebel redoubts. It called the convoy “a stark violation of the sovereignty and the territorial integrity of the Syrian Arab Republic.”
Syria’s Russian-backed offensive in Idlib has killed hundreds of civilians since April and set off panic among the hundreds of thousands of internally displaced people sheltering in the province, according to United Nations officials. A flurry of airstrikes in recent days has killed dozens of civilians across the province, activists reported.
Liz Sly contributed from Beirut