Turkey’s main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) deputy Mevlüt Dudu on Tuesday said rockets that killed one and injured 46 in the Reyhanlı district of Hatay province on Sunday were fired from inside Turkish territory, the Cumhuriyet daily reported.
“These rockets have a range of 12 kilometers. The distance between Reyhanlı and the Syrian border is more than that. According to information we obtained, the attack was prepared and carried out from inside Turkish territory,” Dudu told Cumhuriyet, following a visit by a group of CHP deputies to Reyhanlı.
Dudu also said it there was no doubt the attack was carried out by the terrorist organization.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson has also reportedly informed his Turkish counterpart Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu that rockets which over the weekend hit the Turkish town of Reyhanlı and killed a civilian were not fired by the Kurdish armed groups Washington backs.
Çavuşoglu relayed what appeared to be a phone conversation between him and Tillerson over Turkey’s military campaign in the Kurdish region of Afrin in northern Syria in a Tuesday interview with the privately-owned Habertürk news network.
“What’s going on, Mevlüt? Our friends tell us, they haven’t fired any rocket toward Turkey,” Tillerson reportedly told Çavuşoğlu according to the latter.
“I told (Tillerson), we don’t know where your friends get their intelligence. We take into account what our own friends tell us,” Çavuşoğlu said. “You check your sources. And do not speak to us in their (YPG) language,” the Turkish FM said, recollecting the conversation.
Turkish authorities blamed the attack on the US-backed Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) that is fighting off the Turkish army and its Syrian proxies engaged in the offensive to capture Afrin.
A Syrian national was killed and 46 civilians, including 16 Syrians, were injured in cross-border attacks by the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the state-run Anadolu news agency reported.
Turkey on Saturday launched a military operation in the Afrin region of Syria, which is controlled by the Kurdish-Syrian Democratic Union Party (PYD). Turkey views the PYD as the Syrian extension of the PKK. (SCF with turkishminute.com)
