OREANDA-NEWS. Turkish troops began crossing the border with Syria to begin operation for creating a security zone.

As Bloomberg agency citing an unnamed Turkish official reports, a small group entered Syria on the morning of October 9 from two positions. After it a transfer of bigger forces is expected.

At the same time, a source in the administration of the President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan denied information about the start of the operation and called for ignoring such media reports until Ankara publishes an official confirmation.

On October 5, Erdogan announced a readiness to conduct an operation in northern Syria to liberate the territory from the Syrian Kurds’ Self-Defense Forces and create a security zone there.

On October 7, the United States announced its refusal to participate in the operation of Turkey and the withdrawal of its troops from the territory where the clean-up operation will be carried out. According to media reports, this decision was made after a telephone conversation between US President Donald Trump and Erdogan. At the same time, Washington laid a responsibility on Ankara for all the militants of Islamic State terrorist organization (banned in many states, including the USA, Turkey and Russia) who were captured during past 2 years.

On the same day, Turkish aviation attacked the headquarters of the Syrian Kurdish forces, and the next day Erdogan accused the US of a wish to create a security zone not for the benefit of Ankara, but of the coalition of the Syrian Democratic Forces supported by Washington. Turkey considers that Kurdish units of the coalition are terrorists.

Syrian Kurds declared their readiness to begin negotiations with Damascus and Moscow after the withdrawal of all US troops from the border with Turkey.