4 months ago
1
Syria's Army said its operation successful a Kurdish neighbourhood of Aleppo was nearing completion connected aboriginal Saturday (January 10, 2026) and urged fighters from the number to surrender themselves and their weapons.
Government forces began striking the Sheikh Maqsud territory overnight aft the Kurdish fighters defied a deadline to retreat during a impermanent ceasefire.
A subject root told the authoritative SANA quality bureau that the combing cognition successful Sheikh Maqsud was "more than 90%" complete, and that "a fig of SDF members" had been arrested.
In a connection posted by the Ministry of Defence, Syria's Army said "the lone remaining enactment for the equipped elements successful the Sheikh Maqsud country of Aleppo is to surrender themselves and their weapons immediately".
The unit successful Syria's 2nd metropolis erupted aft efforts to integrate the Kurds' de facto autonomous medication and subject into the country's caller authorities stalled.
Since the commencement of the warring connected Tuesday (January 6, 2026), astatine slightest 21 civilians person been killed, according to figures from some sides, and tens of thousands person fled Aleppo.
The clashes, immoderate of the astir aggravated since Syria's caller Islamist authorities took power, contiguous yet different situation arsenic the state struggles to reunify aft ousting longtime ruler Bashar al-Assad successful December 2024. Both sides blasted the different for starting the violence.
On Friday (January 9, 2026), Syrian authorities announced a six-hour model for the Kurdish fighters to leave, but they alternatively refused to "surrender" and vowed to support their districts.
In response, Syria's Army warned it would renew strikes connected subject targets successful Sheikh Maqsud and urged civilians to get retired up of the district's takeover by information forces.
An AFP analogous saw residents laden with belongings fleeing earlier the two-hour humanitarian corridor closed.
Kurdish forces reported coming nether artillery and drone attacks and claimed successful a station connected societal media to beryllium mounting a "fierce and ongoing resistance".
The Army said 3 soldiers had been killed by Kurdish forces, portion authorities tv accused them of launching drones connected residential areas of Aleppo. A formation suspension astatine Aleppo airdrome was extended until precocious Saturday (January 10, 2026).
The SDF controls swathes of Syria's oil-rich northbound and northeast, and was cardinal to the decision of the Islamic State radical successful 2019.
But Ankara views its main constituent arsenic an hold of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which agreed past twelvemonth to extremity its four-decade equipped conflict against Turkey.
Elham Ahmad, a elder authoritative successful the Kurdish medication successful Syria's northeast, accused Syria's authorities of "choosing the way of war" by attacking Kurdish districts and of "seeking to enactment an extremity to the agreements that person been reached". "We are committed to them and we are seeking to instrumentality them," she told AFP.
The March integration statement was meant to beryllium implemented past year, but differences, including Kurdish demands for decentralised rule, person stymied progress.
Mr. Ahmad said that "the United States is playing a mediating role... we anticipation they volition use unit to scope an agreement". A diplomatic root told AFP that U.S. envoy Tom Barrack was headed to Damascus.
Turkey, which shares a 900-km (550-mile) borderline with Syria, has launched successive offensives to propulsion Kurdish forces from the frontier.
“Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa discussed the concern successful a telephone with Turkish person Recep Tayyip Erdogan and said helium was determined to "end the amerciable equipped presence" successful the city,” a Syrian presidency connection said.
UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric expressed alarm implicit the interaction of the warring connected civilians and called connected each parties "to swiftly instrumentality to negotiations to guarantee the afloat implementation of the 10 March agreement".
Nanar Hawach, elder Syria expert astatine the International Crisis Group, said the renewed clashes formed uncertainty connected the government's quality to summation the spot of number factions and sow the state backmost unneurotic aft 14 years of civilian war.
"If the warring escalates, planetary actors volition wonderment astir Damascus's capableness to govern Syria's heterogeneous society," helium added.
Syria's authorities person committed to protecting minorities, but sectarian bloodshed rocked the Alawite and Druze communities past year.
