Turkey strikes ISIL targets in al-Bab during Turkish PM’s visit to Russia

ANKARA

Turkish fighter jets have resumed air strikes against Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) positions in Syria’s al-Bab, destroying nine positions late on Dec. 6, during a visit by Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım to Russia. 

Turkish warplanes carried out air strikes in al-Bab between 9:12 p.m. and 9:54 p.m. on Dec. 6, the Turkish General Staff said in a statement.

Four ISIL shelters, three headquarters and a tank were destroyed in the air strikes.  

While the Turkish-backed Syrian opposition has staged a siege west of al-Bab, Turkey’s aerial campaign has only continued on and off in northern Syria due to the Syrian Air Force’s threat to Turkish warplanes. 

Ankara has assured Russia that its military offensive does not target Aleppo, but merely al-Bab, in northern Aleppo province.  

On Aug. 24, the Turkish Armed Forces launched an operation in Syria, the Euphrates Shield operation, with Free Syrian Army (FSA) fighters to clear the country’s southern border of both Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and Syrian Kurdish Democratic Union Party (PYD) forces, which Ankara considers as a terrorist group linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).