Cease-fire fragile in the northeast of Syria. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday (October 18th) that the military offensive will resume if Kurdish soldiers do not withdraw from the area.

"If the promises are fulfilled by Tuesday night, the issue of the security zone will have been resolved, otherwise Operation 'Source of Peace' will resume as soon as the 120-hour deadline expires," he said. he said at a press conference.

Under an agreement ripped out Thursday by US Vice President Mike Pence during a visit to Ankara, Turkey has agreed to suspend for five days its offensive launched Oct. 9, and to end it if Kurdish forces of the YPG, considered "terrorists" by Ankara, withdraw during this period from the border areas of Turkey in the north-east of Syria.

"We have set a limit: 120 hours, at the end of which this region must be cleared of terrorist groups," Recep Tayyip Erdogan added. The agreement also provides for the establishment of a "security zone" of 32 km wide in Syrian territory.

The Turkish president reiterated on Friday that this zone should "extend in length over 444 km" and not only in areas where Turkish forces have already taken control in Syrian territory, namely 120 km between the Tal Abyad localities and Ras al-Ain.

He also said that some of the 3.6 million Syrian refugees living in Turkey would be settled in this "safe zone".

In order to accommodate these refugees "we plan to build 140 villages with 5,000 inhabitants for each village and 10 districts with a population of 30,000 for each district," said Recep Tayyip Erdogan. He further assured that Turkey did not intend to remain indefinitely in northern Syria. "We do not intend to stay there, it's out of the question."

Turkish intervention in Syria on which French President Emmanuel Macron returned on Friday after a European Council in Brussels. The military offensive against the Kurdish allies of the anti-Islamic State coalition is a "gross fault" of the West and NATO, said the head of state, pinning the passage "madness" of Ankara will be "complicit" in case of resurgence of the jihadist group.

The question of the military intervention of Turkey, a member of NATO, will be the subject "in the coming weeks" of a four-way meeting, "undoubtedly in London", with the Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the German Chancellor Angela Merkel and British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, also announced Emmanuel Macron.

With AFP