Turkey on Monday warned the United States not to allow demographic changes in the Syrian city of Raqa after Kurdish-Arab forces launched a US-backed operation to capture the Takfiri bastion.

Turkish forces are conspicuously absent from the operation, even though they are present in northern Syria in their own incursion in support of pro-Ankara Syrian militants against ISIL insurgents.

Deputy Prime Minister Numan Kurtulmus said Raqa — like Aleppo, the divided main city of northern Syria, and Mosul in Iraq “belonged to the people” who lived there before conflict erupted.

“Changing the demographic structure will in no way make any contribution to making peace,” he told reporters in televised comments.

Ankara had previously expressed alarm that the Kurdish-Arab Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) leading the offensive were dominated by the Kurdish Peoples’ Protection Units (YPG) militia.

It considers the YPG to be an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) which has waged an insurgency against Ankara for more than three decades.

Turkey has said it would stay out of any operation involving the YPG.

Turkey fears an influx of Kurds to Raqa will change the ethnic composition of the Arab-majority area close to its border.

Source: AFP