ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – The mandate approved by the Turkish parliament, permitting a continuation of military operations in both Iraq and Syria, gives Ankara a significant role in shaping the post-Islamic State (ISIS) future of those two neighbors. Saturday’s vote was also the first in the new session of parliament, where Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said Turkey was in Syria to create a “safe area free of terror organizations” which would be 5,000 square kilometers in size. Erdogan was also adamant that the Turkish military will play a role in the Mosul operation, vowing that “no one can prevent us from participating.” Turkey is maintaining a military presence in both northwestern Syria and northwestern Iraq, neither of which is being carried out with the consent of the weakened governments in those countries. The vote is a renewal of a mandate voted first in October 2014 and renewed in September 2015. Both votes were carried out when Turkey had advisory forces in Iraq and before its more recent intervention in Syria. Only the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) voted against this extension. In Syria, Turkey intervened on August 24 in support of hundreds of Free Syrian Army (FSA) fighters and forced ISIS militants to withdraw south of the border. Turkey said its Syria intervention is aimed at pushing ISIS back from its border and preventing the Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) from advancing westward of the Euphrates River. In Iraq’s Nineveh, Turkey deployed military advisors to train Kurdish Peshmerga forces and the Sunni Hashd al-Watani militia to fight ISIS in that province last year. Baghdad has been demanding Turkish forces withdraw since last December when Turkey sent additional military forces to protect its base in Bashiqa, near Mosul, from ISIS attacks, without the explicit authorization of the Iraqi government.
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