{"id":14097,"date":"2018-09-06T16:25:17","date_gmt":"2018-09-06T16:25:17","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=14097"},"modified":"2018-09-06T16:25:17","modified_gmt":"2018-09-06T16:25:17","slug":"moroccan-judge-holds-first-hearing-in-case-of-captive-girl","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/?p=14097","title":{"rendered":"Moroccan judge holds first hearing in case of captive girl"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

\nANKARA: There has been heavy diplomatic traffic between Ankara and its Western allies since Russian warplanes began bombing Syria\u2019s Idlib province, which borders Turkey and is home to more than 3 million civilians.<\/p>\n

James Jeffrey, US special representative to Syria and a former ambassador to Turkey, visited Ankara on Tuesday, as did German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas on Wednesday. They met their counterparts to discuss Syria.<\/p>\n

US Secretary of State Michael Pompeo spoke with his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu on Wednesday.<\/p>\n

\u201cBoth agreed any Assad regime military offensive in Idlib would be an unacceptable, reckless escalation of the conflict in Syria,\u201d said State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert.<\/p>\n

As Ankara and Berlin try to mend ties, Maas tweeted in Turkish upon his arrival that Turkey is a partner of Germany.<\/p>\n

There are fears that an assault on Idlib could lead to 700,000 Syrians fleeing to Turkey and trying to go to Europe from there.<\/p>\n

The Syrian regime, with the backing of Iran and Russia, is gearing up for a major military offensive in the province, which is controlled by various armed opposition groups.<\/p>\n

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan recently warned of a potential massacre if missiles are fired into Idlib.<\/p>\n

During a joint press conference with Maas, Cavusoglu condemned Russia\u2019s bombing of the province, and said the Turkish and German positions on Syria overlap.<\/p>\n

Nicholas Danforth, a senior policy analyst at the Bipartisan Policy Center\u2019s National Security Project, told Arab News: \u201cThe looming regime assault on Idlib represents an ideal opportunity for the US, Europe and Turkey to work together to forestall a strategic and humanitarian disaster.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added: \u201cWhile none are eager to see extremist groups remain in control of the territory, all three have more to lose from a regime takeover that sends militants and refugees flooding into Turkey and perhaps on to Europe.\u201d<\/p>\n

Without Western military and diplomatic backing, Turkey would seem to have little choice but to accept, if not help facilitate, the Syrian regime\u2019s plans, Danforth said.<\/p>\n

With a trilateral summit between Turkey, Russia and Iran set to take place on Friday, Ankara\u2019s stance on Idlib diverges from that of Moscow and Tehran. The province was originally designated a \u201cde-escalation zone\u201d by the three countries.<\/p>\n

Kerim Has, a Moscow-based analyst on Turkish-Russian relations and Eurasian affairs, said Ankara\u2019s increasing contacts with its Western partners may have little, if any, impact on Russian policy in Syria.<\/p>\n

\u201cOther than the US and UK, the leading European countries don\u2019t have a strong presence on the ground in Syria,\u201d he told Arab News.<\/p>\n

\u201cEuropeans\u2019 negotiations with Turkey are mostly related to a possible new refugee influx and a transfer of the jihadist threat to Europe,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think Russia and the EU have similar perspectives on eliminating the terrorist and jihadist threat on the ground without causing mass migration into Turkey and so on.\u201d<\/p>\n

The US and UK \u201cmay try to disrupt Moscow\u2019s plans in Idlib and Russian-Turkish relations in general, but preventing the Idlib operation doesn\u2019t seem to be a priority for them,\u201d Has said.<\/p>\n

He anticipates that at the trilateral summit, Erdogan will ask Moscow for more time to persuade the Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham jihadist alliance to lay down its arms, to prevent Syrian regime forces from entering the center of Idlib, and to permit the creation of a safe zone along Turkey\u2019s border with the province for refugees and Ankara-backed rebels.<\/p>\n

\u201cBut I\u2019m not sure that most of these requests will be welcomed by Moscow,\u201d Has said. \u201cIn that sense, I don\u2019t expect a critical or meaningful impact from Turkey\u2019s recent dialogue with its Western partners on Russian plans in Idlib.\u201d<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

ANKARA: There has been heavy diplomatic traffic between Ankara and its Western allies since Russian warplanes began bombing Syria\u2019s Idlib province, which borders Turkey and is home to more than 3 million civilians. James Jeffrey, US special representative to Syria and a former ambassador to Turkey, visited Ankara on Tuesday, as did German Foreign Minister…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":14098,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-14097","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-middle_east_news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14097","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14097"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14097\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14098"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14097"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14097"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/qatar-news.org\/qatarnewsEn\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14097"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}