SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Turkey’s foreign minister’s remarks on Friday triggered a wide protest in the Syria opposition-controlled territories northwest of the country after the minister urged reconciliation with Syrian President Bashar Assad.
Hundreds of Syrian opposition supporters protested in northwestern Syria, including outside a Turkish army post, to denounce remarks by Turkey’s foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu.
Turkish Foreign Minister Cavusoglu told reporters on Thursday that Turkey supports a political reconciliation between the Syrian opposition and Assad’s government for the sake of stability.
Turkey has played as the main supporter of the opposition including the armed forces Since Syria’s civil war broke out in 2011, the country also hosts 3.65 million Syrians who fled the war at home.
In Friday’s protest outside a Turkish military post in the northwestern Syrian town of Mastoumeh, demonstrators chanted that the “Turkish army is a traitor” and that “Syrian people are not for sale.” The associated press reported.
“We don’t want to reconcile with the killer of children,” read a placard carried by a Syrian boy in Mastoumeh, a reference to Assad.
According to local reports there, the protests have also erupted protests in the northern Syrian towns of Azaz, al-Bab, Afrin, Tel Abyad as well as Idlib, which is the last-remaining Syrian opposition-held area.
There were calls for the removal of all Turkish flags from the northern parts of Syria, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.
The Turkish government backs thousands of troops in the area and backs a coalition of armed groups opposed to Assad under the banner of the Syrian National Army (SNA).
The northwest near the Turkish border is the last area still in the hands of the opposition.
