Erdogan exploits international platforms to promote his suspicious schemes: Foreign Ministry

DAMASCUS, (ST)- Syria has renewed its complete rejection of the policies and plans being promoted by President of the Turkish regime Recep Tayyib Erdogan on the establishment of a so-called “safe zone” in the northeastern part of Syria to move the refugees to it, according to an official source at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Expatriates.

Commenting on Erdogan’s remarks at the Global Refugee Forum in Geneva, the source told SANA that once again, Erdogan is trying to use international platforms to promote his suspicious plans about what he calls “safe zone” and to use the issue of the refugees’ return as a pretext to deport one million Syrians (refugees) to the areas the Turkish regime occupies in the northeast of Syria as part of a process of forcible expulsion of the residents of those areas and the replacement of others.

 Despite the false humanitarian mask Erdogan is trying to use to beg for  international support for his illegal proposals and malicious agendas on Syrian soil, his demand to use Syrian oil resources to fund his suspicious plans has uncovered his true intentions which are based on occupation, aggression and violation of international law, the source said.

The open-door policy that Erdogan referred to in his speech at the Forum was in fact nothing but a “revolving door policy” used by Erdogan to arm, finance and allow access to thousands of foreign terrorists into Syria, the sources said.

This policy has forced thousands of Syrians to leave their country across the borders fleeing the crimes of the Turkish regime-backed terrorism and allowed Erdogan to use the refugee issue as a blackmail card to obtain certain political and financial gains from his partners in the conspiracy on Syria, the source added.

The source went on to say that Erdogan has used this same door to smuggle and sell Syrian oil in Turkey in collusion with Daesh and Jabhat al-Nusra terrorist organizations.

According to the source, Syria expresses its dissatisfaction that the organizers of the Forum have chosen Erdogan to be one of the parties to hold the forum, and that the forum was turned into a platform for the propaganda of the Turkish regime to promote its proposals that take advantage of with the suffering of the displaced Syrians.

Syria calls on the United Nations and the High Commissioner for Refugees to adopt a clear position on these Turkish plans and policies that gravely breach the principles and goals of the UN Charter and the legal obligations that Turkey should adhere to as a party to the international agreements including the 1951 Refugee Convention, the source said.

Syria reaffirms that it will spare no effort to defend its people, sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of the Turkish regime’s attacks, greeds and crimes against the Syrians, the source concluded.

Hamda Mustafa