Daily Times

ISTANBUL: US Vice President Joe Biden said on Saturday that the United States and Turkey were prepared for a military solution against Islamic State in Syria if a political settlement was not possible, amid uncertainty over scheduled peace talks.

The latest round of Syria peace talks are planned to begin on Monday in Geneva but were at risk of being delayed partly because of a dispute over who will comprise the opposition delegation. “We do know it would better if we can reach a political solution but we are prepared …, if that’s not possible, to have a military solution to this operation in taking out Daesh,” Biden said at a news conference after a meeting with Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu. Daesh is the pejorative Arabic acronym for Islamic State insurgents who hold parts of Syria.

A US official clarified that Biden was talking about a military solution to Islamic State, not Syria as a whole. The Saudi-backed Syrian opposition ruled out even indirect negotiations unless Damascus took steps including a halt to Russian air strikes. Biden said he and Davutoglu also discussed how the two NATO allies could further support Sunni Arab rebel forces fighting to oust President Bashar al-Assad. Saleh Muslim, co-chair of the Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD), the main Kurdish political grouping in Syria, said on Friday the Syria peace talks would fail if Syrian Kurds are not represented. While the United States draws a distinction between PYD, whose fighters it supports, and the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) in Turkey, Davutoglu reiterated the Turkish position that the PYD’s military wing is part of and supported by the PKK.

The PYD’s military wing, the People’s Protection Units (YPG) has seized swathes of Syria from Islamic State with the help of US-led strikes and declared it an autonomous administration, to Ankara’s chagrin. Davutoglu said on Saturday the YPG had become an increasing threat to Turkey. Ankara has fought a decades-long insurgency against Kurdish PKK separatists which in July reignited into a violent confrontation with Turkish security forces.

Biden strongly criticised the PKK which is designated a terrorist organisation by the United States, the European Union and Turkey. “ISIL is not the only existential threat… the PKK is equally threat and we are aware of that,” Biden said. ISIL is another acronym for Islamic State. “The PKK has shown no desire or inclination to do that (live in peace). It is a terrorist group plain and simple. And what they continue to do is absolutely outrageous.”

Meanwhile, a total of 29 people were killed, including a woman, by an airstrike against rebel-held area in Syria’s eastern province of Deir al-Zour on Saturday, a monitor group reported.

Tens of others were wounded, some critically, when unknown warplanes struck the town of Khusham in the eastern countryside of Deir al-Zour, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. It added that it wasn’t clear whether the strikes were carried out by Syrians or Russians. The UK-based watchdog group said the attack on Khusham came just a day after 44 people, including 15 children and eight women, were killed in similar airstrikes against areas in eastern Deir al-Zour.

The Observatory said intense battles have been raging in Deir al-Zour since mid-January between Syrian government forces and the Islamic State (IS) group. The battles are focused in the northwestern part of Deir al-Zour, where the IS group unleashed a wide-scale offensive on Jan.16 against Syrian army positions, managing to make some gains, according to the Observatory. The watchdog group said days of battles were coupled with daily airstrikes by government forces. It added that over 200 government soldiers and 110 IS militants have been killed.

The Observatory, which relies on a network of activists on ground, said the IS group was making use of the tough weather conditions to make progress against the Syrian military positions. It added that the terror group succeeded in capturing parts of the Ayash arm depots and the al-Saeka military camp during its offensive. The progress has enabled the IS to open a supply line between its controlled areas in the western countryside of Deir al-Zour and the newly fallen areas in the northwestern part of the city.