Seoul Gazette - Syrian army tells civilians to stay away from Kurdish positions east of Aleppo

The deployment comes as Syria's Islamist-led government seeks to extend its authority across the country, but progress has stalled on integrating the Kurds' de facto autonomous administration and forces into the central government under a deal reached in March.

The Syrian military said in a statement it urges "our civilian population to stay away" from all Kurdish military positions east of Aleppo, adding that "a humanitarian corridor will be opened towards the city of Aleppo" on Thursday morning until the afternoon.

The army had closed several roads in the eastern Aleppo province "for security reasons".

The United States, which for years has supported Kurdish fighters but also backs Syria's new authorities, urged all parties to "avoid actions that could further escalate tensions" in a statement by the US military's Central Command chief Admiral Brad Cooper.

Syrian state television on Tuesday published an army statement with a map declaring a large area east of Aleppo city a "closed military zone" and said "all armed groups in this area must withdraw to the east of the Euphrates" River.

The area, controlled by Kurdish forces, extends from near Deir Hafer, around 50 kilometres (30 miles) from Aleppo, to the Euphrates about 30 kilometres further east, as well as towards the south.

State news agency SANA published images on Wednesday showing military reinforcements en route from the coastal province of Latakia, while a military source on the ground, requesting anonymity, said reinforcements were arriving from both Latakia and the Damascus region.

Both sides reported limited skirmishes overnight.

Kurdish forces in a statement accused government troops of bombing a post office, a bakery and other civilian facilities in Deir Hafer, warning of "a wider confrontation and its serious repercussions on civilians, infrastructure, and vital facilities".

An AFP correspondent on the outskirts of Deir Hafer reported hearing intermittent artillery shelling on Wednesday, which the military source said was due to government targeting of positions belonging to the US-backed, Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces.

- 'Declaration of war' -

The SDF controls swathes of the country's oil-rich north and northeast, much of which it captured during Syria's civil war and the fight against the Islamic State group.

On Monday, Syria accused the SDF of sending reinforcements to Deir Hafer and said it would send its own personnel there in response.

Kurdish forces on Tuesday denied any build-up of their personnel and accused the government of attacking the town, while state television said SDF sniper fire there killed one person.

Cooper urged "a durable diplomatic resolution through dialogue".

Elham Ahmad, a senior official in the Kurdish administration, said that government forces were "preparing themselves for another attack".

"The real intention is a full-scale attack" against Kurdish-held areas, she told an online press conference, accusing the government of having made a "declaration of war" and breaking the March agreement on integrating Kurdish forces.

Syria's government took full control of Aleppo city over the weekend after capturing its Kurdish-majority Sheikh Maqsud and Ashrafiyeh neighbourhoods and evacuating fighters there to Kurdish-controlled areas in the northeast.

Both sides traded blame over who started the violence last week that killed dozens of people and displaced tens of thousands.

- PKK, Turkey -

On Tuesday in Qamishli, the main Kurdish city in the country's northeast, thousands of people demonstrated against the Aleppo violence, with some burning pictures of Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa and Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, an AFP correspondent said.

Turkey has long been hostile to the SDF, seeing it as an extension of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and a major threat along its southern border.

Last year, the PKK announced an end to its long-running armed struggle against the Turkish state and began destroying its weapons, but Ankara has insisted that the move includes armed Kurdish groups in Syria.

On Tuesday, the PKK called the "attack on the Kurdish neighbourhoods in Aleppo" an attempt to sabotage peace efforts between it and Ankara.

A day earlier, Ankara's ruling party levelled the same accusation against Kurdish fighters.

The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights reported 45 civilians killed in the Aleppo violence, as well as 60 soldiers and fighters from both sides.

Aleppo civil defence official Faysal Mohammad said Tuesday that 50 bodies had been recovered from the Kurdish-majority neighbourhoods after the fighting.

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P.Yeo--SG