Following Russian deployment attempts … a convoy of Russian Forces arrives at the SDF-controlled areas north of Aleppo

Aleppo Province, the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights: reliable sources informed the SOHR that a group of Russian Forces arrived at the northern countryside of Aleppo. Their convoy entered the SDF-controlled Tal Ref’at town, which along with the other SDF-controlled villages and areas there are repeatedly shelled by the Turkish Forces and their backed factions. This comes after the failed attack on Ein Daqna a few weeks ago in which many fighters of the SDF and the factions were killed and injured.

The SOHR also learned that the entry of the Russian Forces convoy to the SDF-controlled areas in the northern countryside of Aleppo followed their endeavors since the first half of July 2017 to reach an agreement with the Kurdish forces regarding the deployment of their military police forces to the area extending from Mare’ city to Deir Jamal town in the northern countryside of Aleppo, at the contact lines with the Turkish Forces and their backed factions. The SOHR learned then that such endeavors which are still met with refusal by the SDF come with Turkey’s continued preparations for a military operation aiming at seizing control over the villages located between Mare’ and Deir Jamal, of which the SDF took control late 2015 and early 2016 and at attacking ‘Afrin area.

Major Kurdish sources rejected on the 13th of July 2017 the rumors circulating about a Kurdish-Russian agreement regarding the YPG and SDF-controlled areas in Afrin and the northern countryside of Aleppo. Sources confirmed then to the SOHR that clauses published from the Russian Statement regarding Afrin and Aleppo countryside, including “the withdrawal from the towns located between Mare’ city and Deir Jamal area; the establishment of Turkish military bases in Afrin and handing their management over to civil councils after expelling rebel fighters from Afrin; and allowing access between the northern countryside of Aleppo and Idlib Province through a road to be opened later”, are completely untrue. They also asserted to the SOHR that the YPG met with refusal the Russian endeavors to deploy Russian military police or a civil police force affiliated with the regime to the SDF-controlled villages and towns located between Deir Jamal and Mare’ to avoid a Turkish attack on them.

Tens of thousands of people went out in demonstrations in the YPG- controlled Afrin area, located in the northwestern countryside of Aleppo, denouncing the Turkish intervention and the military operation Turkey intends to carry out against the Syria Democratic Forces in Afrin area and the northern countryside of Aleppo. They also denounced the Turkish shelling which left dead and injured in the SDF-controlled villages. Such endeavors coincided with the widespread resentment in the SDF controlled areas in the northern and northwestern countryside of Aleppo as a result of the Turkish shelling that targeted SDF-controlled villages, killing a woman, 2 of her children along with two more civilians and injuring 8 others, with varied degrees of severity. This also coincided with Turkey’s continued preparations for a military act with the support of the rebel and Islamic factions operating in Aleppo country; an act aiming at taking control of the area extending from Mare’ to Deir Jamal in order to allow tens of thousands of the displaced to return to their villages in the northern countryside of Aleppo. The area of Afrin and its outskirts along with the SDF-controlled areas in the northern countryside of Aleppo, have been repeatedly shelled by the Turkish Forces and the rebel and Islamic factions. Shelling was accompanied by an exchange of targeting between the factions and the Syria Democratic Forces with shells and heavy machine guns. Tensions also prevailed the area, near the Syrian-Turkish border since the 20th of June 2017 following the arrival of the reinforcements of the Turkish forces to the southern countryside of Azaz.