ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – Turkey’s Foreign Ministry has hit back after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Washington would not let Turkey “slaughter the Kurds” in Syria. “Minister Pompeo’s equating the PYD/YPG terrorist organization with the Kurds, even if not deliberate, indicates a worrying lack of knowledge,” Hami Aksoy, spokesperson for Turkey’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said in a published statement on Friday. Ankara alleges that the Democratic Union Party (PYD) and the armed People’s Protection Units (YPG) in northern Syria are terror groups with ties to the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Turkish troops and their allied Syrian militias have built up their forces in northern Syria, west of Manbij and the Euphrates River in anticipation of an attack on Kurdish territory. Concern for the fate of the Kurds, who are a key ally of the United States and the global coalition in the war against ISIS, compelled advisors to convince US President Donald Trump to walk back his plan for a rapid withdrawal from Syria that would have left the Kurds exposed to a Turkish attack. Trump still wants out of the country, but has agreed to slow down the process. “The importance of ensuring that the Turks don’t slaughter the Kurds, the protection of religious minorities there in Syria – all of those things are still part of the American mission set,” Pompeo told Newsmax on Thursday. Aksoy said Turkey rejects “both the style and content” of Pompeo’s statement. Turkey “embraces all Syrian people, including the Kurds,” he said, and “will continue to oversee the protection of the rights of Syrian Kurds in efforts to achieve a political solution to the Syrian conflict.” Kurds, however, point to Afrin as evidence of Turkey’s true intention. Turkish forces and Syrian militias who took control of the area in early 2018, are accused of looting, kidnapping and killing Kurds, and instituting demographic change. According to the United Nations, people who fled their homes during the conflict are still being prevented from returning and farmers in Afrin are subject to heavy taxes by armed groups. Related: From Afrin to Erbil: One refugee family’s journey
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