Ankara slams Arab League call for Turkey to withdraw from Afrin

ANKARA - Anadolu Agency

Turkey on April 17 slammed an Arab League resolution calling for an end to Turkey’s military operation in the northwestern Syrian district of Afrin, which was launched on Jan. 20 to clear the area of Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG).

In a statement, Foreign Ministry spokesman Hami Aksoy said the Arab League “ignored Turkey’s work to reduce violence, maintain the political process in Syria, and provide a home to millions of displaced Syrian refugees.”

On April 15, the Arab League passed a resolution calling on Turkish forces to withdraw from Afrin, saying that doing so would help efforts to solve the Syria crisis.

“The Operation Olive Branch in Afrin is a self-defense operation against terrorist organizations trying to divide Syria,” Aksoy said in response.

Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since 2011, when the Bashar al-Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests with unexpected ferocity.

Since then, hundreds of thousands of people have been killed in the conflict, according to U.N. figures.