Report: Syrian Opposition, Turkey Fully Agree to Set Up Buffer Zone Near Borders

The Turkish government and the Syrian opposition have agreed to set up a buffer zone in the Northern parts of Syria and near the borders with Turkey, media reports said.
“Turkey and us are in full agreement over setting up a buffer zone in an area of 40 square kilometers along the Turkish-Syrian borders,” the Arabic-language Al-Watan newspaper quoted Syrian opposition’s provisional Prime Minister Ahmad Tomeh as saying on Wednesday.

Tomeh noted that the creation of the buffer zone will allow the Syrian opposition to increase its contacts with the militant groups inside Syria.

Using the Kurdish city of Kobani to make a case, the US and Turkish governments took the opportunity to repackage their plans for an invasion of Syria from 2011, which called for the establishment of a Turkish-controlled northern buffer zone and a no-fly zone over Syrian airspace. This time the plans were presented under the humanitarian pretext of peacekeeping.

In October, Syria’s Foreign Ministry rejected foreign powers’ talk about imposing a buffer zone on Syrian soil.

“The Turkish attempts to establish a buffer zone on the Syrian soil is a flagrant violation to the charters of the UN and international law,” the ministry said in a statement.

It added that “Syria totally rejects the establishment of a buffer zone on any part of its terrain under any pretext and also rejects the foreign military intervention on its soil”.

The ministry stressed that the Syrian government would take all necessary measures to protect its national sovereignty and the unity of its territories after consulting with other countries.

The statement came as Turkey had been floating the idea of setting up a buffer zone on the Syrian side of the borders under many pretexts, mainly to solve the issue of the Syrian refugees on Turkish soil.