Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said he plans to relocate up to three million Syrian refugees from Turkey to a strip of territory along Syria’s northern border with Turkey.
“Talking about the return and resettlement of Syrians to the safe zone is a false claim,” Muallem told the pro-Hezbollah al-Mayadeen TV.
“If Erdogan wants to return Syrians, he has to coordinate with the Syrian state to ensure their safe return to the areas they left rather than carrying out ethnic cleansing in specific areas because this violates international law,” he said.
Turkey has to choose whether it wants to be a “neighboring country” or a “foe”, Muallem added.
Turkey and the United States agreed to establish the safe zone in August in order to placate Ankara’s security concerns, but the precise length, depth, and administration of the area have not yet been agreed.
The Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), which has carved out a self-governing region separate from Damascus, has warned the resettlement of non-indigenous Syrians there would make Kurds a minority in their own land and could inflame ethnic tensions.
Ilham Ahmed, co-leader of the region’s ruling Syrian Democratic Council (SDC), told the Defense Post on September 24 that only those who “belong to the area originally” would be permitted to resettle there.
“We have informed the Americans that only local people from the area can come back. And they know this,” she added.
Two days later the US Special Envoy to the Global Coalition against the Islamic State (ISIS) James Jeffrey told a briefing they have agreed with Turkey to return the refugees “in a safe, voluntary, and dignified way”.
“But we have signed up for the return of refugees to their homes if they came to that area,” he added.
Erdogan has meanwhile continued to insist on his plan to clear his country of Syrian “guests” and resettle them in a 30km-deep area in northern Syria’s Kurdish- majority region.
Erdogan wants a large buffer zone in order to force the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) away from Turkey’s southern border.
Although the YPG forms the backbone of the US-backed SDF, which led the ground war against the Islamic State (ISIS) in northeast Syria, Ankara considers the group a terrorist offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK).
Observers believe Erdogan intends to kill two birds with one stone by diluting the Kurdish region with Arab refugees while simultaneously driving out Kurdish forces.
More than 360,000 Syrians have already been returned to other parts of Syria controlled by Turkish-backed groups.
Erdogan set a deadline of late-September for the US government to take practical steps to establish the safe zone.
When this deadline expired on Tuesday, the Turkish president renewed his threat to attack Kurdish forces and set up the safe zone unilaterally.
“We told those who kept delaying Turkey’s proposals to eliminate the terrorist organization and make Syrian territory safe for refugees that this game is up,” he told the Turkish parliament on Tuesday.
“Turkey does not have a single day to waste in this matter. At this point, we have no alternative but to continue on our own path,” he added, indicating Ankara intends to seize the territory unilaterally,” he added.
Unnamed sources told Turkish media outlet Haberturk on Friday that 140 villages, each housing 5,000 Syrian refugees, and 10 districts, each accommodating 30,000 Syrian refugees, will be built in the safe zone, which will be 30km deep.
Erdogan confirmed the construction blitz on Tuesday, but put the number of the districts at 50.
“These towns and villages will be built with the support of the international community. We have completed the preliminary work regarding the villages and towns to be established and identified their locations,” he told lawmakers.
The US and Turkey have conducted several air and ground patrols in the area.
The SDF has withdrawn its fighters from several border areas and destroyed fortifications as a sign of commitment to the US-Turkish agreement.
