Turkey prepares to resume fighting in Syria

As a part of Turkish military convoys going to the Idlib de-escalation zone, lately trucks and conveyors with building blocks that the Turkish military use for engineering purposes at their “observation posts” in Syria are increasingly found, learned BulgarianMilitary.com citing EurAsia Daily.

Such “posts” have long turned into bases of advanced defense, and there are significantly more of them than officially considered. In particular, the Turks are building fortified strongholds in the area of ​​the city of Sarakib in the east of Idlib province, the Military Observer portal reports today, April 3.

The network got videos and photos of transport columns with building blocks that proceeded on April 1 and 2 through the Kafr-Lusin checkpoint on the Turkish-Syrian border. Some of them were sent to the Turkish base bases under construction in the area between the cities of Sarakib and Ariha.

Much indicates that Ankara is carefully preparing for a possible resumption of hostilities in Idlib, where a ceasefire is currently being generally adhered to, established since March 6 according to the agreements of Russia and Turkey.

Over the past month, the Turkish military regrouped both its forces and the militants they supported from the National Liberation Front, deployed hundreds of additional armored vehicles, howitzers, multiple launch rocket systems and other strike weapons in Idlib and Aleppo provinces.

At the same time, Ankara’s mission to withdraw all “irreconcilable” Islamist militants from the southern regions of the Idlib front, assigned to it by Russian-Turkish agreements of March 5, was actually frustrated.

South of the M-4 highway (Aleppo-Latakia), along which a security corridor should be created in the Idlib de-escalation zone, terrorists remain, in particular the Islamic Party of Turkestan.

Recall that Russia and Turkey, following the results of the six-hour talks on March 5 in Moscow, agreed to establish a new ceasefire regime in the Idlib de-escalation zone, which entered into force on 01 March local time. Russia and Turkey are creating a six-kilometer-wide security corridor north and south of the M-4 highway in the northwest of the Arab Republic.

It was also agreed on March 15 to begin joint patrolling of the Russian and Turkish military along the section of the indicated route from the settlement of Trumba (two kilometers west of the city of Sarakib) to the village of Ain al-Khabr. The relevant agreement is framed in the form of an additional protocol to the Sochi memorandum of defense ministers of Russia and Turkey of September 17, 2018.