US could distribute equipment to Syrian Kurds ‘very quickly’
The United States may start distributing some arms and equipment to Kurdish YPG fighters in Syria “very quickly” but it will be done incrementally, a spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition fighting Islamic State said on Wednesday.
Despite fierce opposition from NATO ally Turkey, U.S. President Donald Trump this week approved supplying arms to the YPG to support an operation to retake the Syrian city of Raqqa from Islamic State.
“We’ve got a certain amount of supply in the country already that was used to equip the Syrian Arab Coalition and some of that may be distributed very quickly,” Coalition spokesman U.S. Air Force Colonel John Dorrian told reporters. He did not give a specific timeline but said it would be incremental and provided as needed.
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Turkey’s Erdogan says hopes decision to arm Kurdish militia changed before U.S. visit
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday he hoped a U.S. decision to arm Kurdish forces fighting Islamic State in Syria will be changed by the time he visits Washington for talks with President Donald Trump next week, Reuters reports.
After Trump approved the arms supply to support a campaign to retake the Syrian city of Raqqa, Erdogan told a news conference he wanted to believe that Turkey’s allies would side with Ankara and not with terrorist organisations.
Turkey views the Kurdish YPG militia as the Syrian extension of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), which has fought an insurgency in southeast Turkey since 1984 and is considered a terrorist group by the United States, Turkey and Europe.
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