A Turkish military convoy including tanks has been dispatched to the Syrian border in Turkey’s southern Hatay province, a security source said on Jan. 13.
Video footage shows a group of five tanks loaded on trucks and driven on an unpaved road. A military source, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to restrictions on talking to media, said the tanks were sent as reinforcements to the Turkish border units.
Early on Jan. 14, a source in the region said the Turkish military hit several People’s Protection Units (YPG) targets in the Afrin district of Syria’s Aleppo province to prevent a “terror corridor” from forming along Turkey’s borders.
The Turkish army fired at least 40 times during the artillery bombardment in Afrin’s five regions including Bosoufane, Jindires and Rajo.
The Turkish artillery units hit the YPG forces from the border province of Hatay.
The military operation follows President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s call for the Democratic Union Party (PYD), the political wing of the YPG and affiliated to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), in Afrin to surrender.
Erdoğan said on Jan. 13 that any venture in the region “has no chance of success” if Turkey has no consent in it, referring to the PYD’s efforts to settle in Syria’s northern regions along the Turkish border.
Turkey will interfere “if the terrorists in Afrin do not surrender,” Erdoğan also said, adding that Turkish forces “are destroying the western wing of this corridor with the Idlib operation.”
On Jan. 13, Turkish artillery units based in Hatay and Syria’s Idlib province hit YPG targets in Afrin’s Bosoufane, Cindirese, Deir Bellout and Rajo districts.