The Turkish army was on Tuesday engaged in intense clashes with Kurdish militia inside Syria as the United States voiced alarm Ankara’s operation could endanger attempts to bring peace to the conflict-torn country. Turkey on Saturday launched operation “Olive Branch” aimed at rooting out the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) militia, which Ankara sees as a terror group, from its Afrin enclave in northern Syria. In his strongest comments yet on the offensive, US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis called for Turkey to show “restraint”. – No fixed timetable –Turkish artillery on Tuesday pounded targets of the YPG inside Syria, the state-run Anadolu news agency said. Turkey also launched air strikes in northern Iraq on Kurdish militants planning an attack, the army said on Tuesday.

Source: Egypt Independent January 23, 2018 11:37 UTC