Over 340,000 Syrians returned home from Turkey: Çavuşoğlu

ANKARA-Anadolu Agency

Hundreds of thousands of Syrians have gone home to parts of Syria cleared of terrorist groups by cross-border Turkish military operations, said the nation's foreign minister on Aug. 23.

“More than 346,000 Syrians have returned to areas of Syria which were cleared of terrorists in Operations Euphrates Shield and Olive Branch,” Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu told a joint press conference in Lebanon alongside his Lebanese counterpart Gebran Bassil, referring to Turkish operations since 2016.

Speaking to reporters in the Lebanese capital Beirut, where he is paying an official visit, Çavuşoğlu touched on the voluntary return of Syrian refugees to their country.

He said Turkey can share its experience with Lebanon on how to provide security to Syrian refugees when they return to their motherland.

“We can organize a joint forum with Lebanon, Jordan, Iraq on Syrian refugees' return to their country,” he said. “We can invite international community to the forum.”

He called on international community to be more “sensitive” towards Syrian refugees.

Turkey hosts some 3.6 million Syrian refugees, more than any country in the world. Lebanon, with 1.5 million, is second.

Since 2016, Turkey's Euphrates Shield and Olive Branch operations in northern Syria have liberated regions including Al-Bab, Afrin, and Azaz from YPG/PKK and ISIL terrorists, making it possible for Syrians who fled the violence there to return home.

Eastern Mediterranean

Çavuşoğlu said any agreement on the Eastern Mediterranean without involving Turkey and Turkish Cypriots will be “null and void”.

He pointed out that Turkey works on its own continental shelf to protect the rights of the Turkish Cypriots.

Turkey has consistently contested the Greek Cypriot administration's unilateral drilling in the Eastern Mediterranean, asserting that the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) also has rights to the resources in the area.

Since spring this year, Ankara has sent two drilling vessels -- Fatih and most recently Yavuz -- to the Eastern Mediterranean, asserting the right of Turkey and the Turkish Republic of North Cyprus (TRNC) to the resources of the region.

Turkey's first seismic vessel, the Barbaros Hayrettin Pasa, bought from Norway in 2013, has been conducting exploration in the Mediterranean since April 2017.

Athens and Greek Cypriots have opposed the move, threatening to arrest the ships' crews and enlisting EU leaders to join their criticism.

In 1974, following a coup aiming at Cyprus' annexation by Greece, Ankara had to intervene as a guarantor power. In 1983, the TRNC was founded.

The decades since then have seen several attempts to resolve them dispute, all ending in failure. The latest one, held with the participation of the guarantor countries -- Turkey, Greece, and the U.K. -- ended in 2017 in Switzerland.

Bilateral relations with Lebanon

The Turkish top diplomat said Turkey will continue to provide security and stability to Lebanon within the frameworks of bilateral relations.

Çavuşoğlu said he discussed with top Lebanese officials on ways to strengthen the Lebanese economy and welfare.

“We know and encourage Turkish companies' interest for investment in Lebanon,” he said.

Referring to the visa-free travel between two countries, he said it enabled more Turkish people to visit Lebanon.

“Over one million Lebanese visit Turkey especially my hometown [Mediterranean resort city of] Antalya,” he added.

During his visit, Çavuşoğlu also met with Lebanon's President Michel Aoun in the Beiteddine Palace near the country's capital.

In addition to bilateral relations and regional issues, matters pertaining to Syrian and Palestinian refugees in Lebanon were also discussed at the meeting, according to diplomatic sources.

Aoun, for his part, said efforts should be made for the return of estimated 1.5 million Syrian refugees in Lebanon, adding that humanitarian assistance should continue to be delivered to them even after their return to their homeland.

The two countries also underlined that they shared the same stance on the issue of Palestine.

"We've conveyed our President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's greetings to President Michel Aoun. We stressed the importance of security and stability of brotherly Lebanon four our region. We discussed Syria, Palestine and the Eastern Mediterranean," Çavuşoğlu said in a Twitter post after the meeting.

Syria has only just begun to emerge from a devastating conflict that began in 2011 when the Bashar al-Assad regime cracked down on demonstrators with unexpected ferocity.

Hundreds of thousands of civilians have been killed or displaced in the conflict, mainly by regime airstrikes targeting opposition-held areas.