Damascus, SANA-Foreign and Expatriates Ministry said the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced yesterday that a regime change in Syria is a priority in his policies, submitting a memorandum at the Turkish Parliament to get an authorization for military action in Syria.
“By so doing, Erdogan has turned Turkey into a springboard of aggression against Syria under the false claim of fighting terrorism and protecting Turkey’s national security,” said the Ministry in two identical letters sent to the UN Secretary-General and head of the UN Security Council.
The declared course of action of the Turkish government constitutes a flagrant violation of the UN Charter which calls for respecting the national sovereignty of states and non-interference in their domestic affairs, said the Ministry.
The Ministry stressed that this also constitutes an aggression against a state which is a founding member of the United Nations, urging the international community to “put an end to the Turkish leadership’s adventurism that poses a threat to regional and international peace and security.”
Addressing the policies of the Turkish government since the outbreak of the crisis, the Ministry indicated that it has stopped at nothing that might add fuel to the fire and deliver a blow to the stability and coexistence that has been a distinguishing feature of the Syrian society.
“The Turkish government should have, as good neighborliness dictates, extended a helping hand to Syria amid the crisis, but it opted instead, as a bearer of the same ideology of religious extremism as the terror groups, to turn Turkey into a support base for these organizations,” said the Ministry.
The Ministry said that the Turkish government is responsible for “every single drop of blood that has been shed in Syria” due to its political, military, and logistical support to terrorist organizations and its role as a conduit for terrorists who came via Turkey to Syria from over 83 countries.
“Not only did the Turkish government kill Syrians and ravage their cities and villages, but also it sought to strike the development process in Syria and the Syrians’ achievements,” said the letters, enumerating Turkey’s practices of dismantling and stealing factories in complicity with the terrorist organizations, with the purchasing of oil that ISIS and other terrorist organizations had stolen being one of the clearest examples of collusion between the Turkish leadership and these groups.
The Turkish government, the Ministry added, can never lay a claim to fighting terrorism as it is to be blamed for an increase in terrorist activity, given its established relations with the terrorists, namely ISIS and Jabhat al-Nusra, in violation of the UNSC Resolutions 2170 and 2187.
Referring to the release of the Turkish consulate members who have been taken hostage in Mosul earlier by ISIS, the Ministry referred to the incident as a “farce” that proves the deep collusion between the Turkish government and ISIS gangs.
The Ministry stressed that the Syrian people, who went to the polls to choose their leadership and determine their future, won’t allow any form of interference in their internal affairs by the Turkish government or any other.
“The reckless policies of the Turkish leadership and its stated aggression against Syria will only lead to a continuation of bloodshed and prolong the crisis in Syria,” the Ministry said.
Concluding the letters, the Ministry warned that Turkey won’t be safe from the “catastrophic fallout” of its policies, which requires that the international community and the UNSC take a decisive and responsible position to compel the Turkish government to abide by its resolutions.
Manal Ismael / Hazem Sabbagh