Two Turkish soldiers were killed as clashes between the neighboring armies continue, the Defense Ministry said, bringing the death toll to about 60 since January, when Turkey began sending thousands of troops to Idlib province. It also said that more than 3,138 men fighting on behalf of Syria had been “neutralized.”

“Our main topic is securing a quick cease-fire in the region,” Erdogan told reporters one day before traveling to Moscow to meet President Vladimir Putin of Russia, Syria’s main backer that has stepped aside to allow Turkey to pummel the Syrian Arab Army. NATO’s second biggest military launched Operation Spring Shield at the weekend, shooting down three Syrian warplanes and destroying several anti-aircraft systems.

Despite supporting opposite sides in the conflict, Erdogan and Putin have deepened bilateral ties, hammered out several truces in Syria and struck energy and weapons deals, much to NATO’s chagrin. Moscow previously greenlit three Turkish military campaigns that targeted the Islamic State and a Kurdish militia and has given Ankara control of some 3,500 square miles (5,600 square kilometers) of northern Syria.

Rescuing Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s regime has been a central foreign policy priority for Russia since entering the conflict in 2015. But the effort to expand its political leverage in the Middle East and challenge Western dominance in global affairs has also extended to its ties with Turkey.

“Tolerance for Turkey’s ambitions in northern Syria for safe zones is probably the price Russia is willing to pay for the other aspects of the relationship, in which Russia has immense interests,” Marc Pierini, a visiting scholar at the Brussels-based foreign policy think tank Carnegie Europe, told Al-Monitor.

Any cease-fire arrangement is likely to meet a Russian condition to return the vital M4 and M5 highways to Assad and address Turkey’s demands for a buffer zone in Idlib, where displaced people are now sheltering in dire conditions in makeshift camps, said Pierini, who served as the European Union’s ambassador to both Syria and Turkey.

Turkey’s offensive came after prolonged Syrian and Russian bombardment of civilians forced nearly a million people to its closed border since December as the rebels it backs make a last stand in the nine-year-old war that has claimed nearly a half-million lives.

Another humanitarian crisis has erupted on Turkey’s western frontier as Greek border guards use force to push thousands of migrants back to Turkey, which stopped preventing them from trying to reach Europe last week. Turkey argues the threat of new arrivals from Idlib means it could no longer handle those refugees who are already there.

“If European countries want to solve this problem, they must support the political and humanitarian resolution Turkey is trying to achieve in Syria,” Erdogan told members of his party in a televised speech.

The European Union’s foreign policy chief Josep Borrell met with Erdogan in Ankara on Wednesday and said he told Turkish officials not to encourage more migrants to go to its border with Europe.

“Increased pressure at the EU-Turkey border and unilateral actions will not provide answers,” said Borrell, according to a press statement. The EU expects Turkey to stick to an agreement to deter migration that it signed with the bloc in 2016 in exchange for six billion euros, he added.

One man was killed and five others were wounded when Greek security forces used rubber and real bullets on migrants, the governor of the border province of Edirne said. A Greek government spokesman called it “fake news,” denying the use of live rounds and any injuries.

The Turkish president’s press office provided journalists with footage showing an injured person being rushed through a field and photographs of men with what appeared to be wounds from rubber bullets. The Greek government then released a video purportedly showing Turkish guards firing tear gas toward Greece.

Since last week, nearly 136,000 migrants have reached Greece, said the Turkish interior minister, while Greece said it has prevented 27,832 attempts to cross and arrested 220 people who were successful.

Turkey opened its borders just days before launching the Idlib operation, helping to underpin longstanding Russian efforts to sow discord in Europe. Anti-immigrant fervor has destabilized centrist governments and weakened EU institutions, welcomed by Putin, who views the EU project as a threat to his own world vision.

“Every time you have an incident like the one underway at the Greek-Turkish border now, it benefits the extreme right in Europe — and that is extremely beneficial for Russia,” Pierini told Al-Monitor. “That’s a miscalculation for Turkey, because it also [undermines] the EU’s ability to deal efficiently with Turkey.”

The crisis on its southern flank also reveals Europe’s failure to forge a common migration policy and prepare for the inevitable: Erdogan has repeatedly threatened to “open the gates” to migrants as Turkey struggled to cope with the world’s largest population of refugees and diverged with Europe on Syria policy.

For its part, the United States has dispatched its Syria envoy to Ankara and supports a cease-fire in Idlib. Erdogan said on Wednesday he also had promises of ammunition from US President Donald Trump. Washington has stopped short of sending Turkey the Patriot missiles it requested, a wish unlikely to be granted after Erdogan bought a Russian-made defense system that has wrought the threat of US sanctions.

“The US recognizes that this is an opportunity to push back against Assad and Putin and restore confidence with Turkey, even though a break in Russian-Turkish ties remains unlikely," said Soner Cagaptay, the director of the Turkish Research Program at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy.

“Right now is the perfect constellation for Turkey, where Putin does not want a rupture with Erdogan and the US wants to use this chance to repair its rupture with Turkey,” he said.

Meanwhile, emotions are running high in Ankara as more Turkish soldiers fall in Idlib. A fistfight broke out in parliament on Wednesday after a lawmaker from the main opposition party criticized Erdogan’s years-old comments about dead Turkish soldiers.

Most Turks support the military operation, but the government is ensuring that dissent is not expressed. The state-appointed governor of Istanbul banned anti-war protests through March 10 for security reasons as well as “to protect the rights and freedoms of others.”

Al-Monitor

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