Following protests, Turkish Interior Minister cancels trip to Northern Syria

Turkey’s Minister of Internal Affairs Suleyman Soylu canceled a visit to Syria’s north after Turkey failed to ease weeks-long protests that show Turkey-backed opposition’s anger towards a reconciliation with the Syrian regime, UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) said.

According to the SOHR, Soylu planned to visit on January 8 the Northern Syria with a delegation of Turkish officials, to open a new compound of camps in Sarmada area in northern Idlib countryside, established by Turkish organizations.

Turkish Interior Ministry gave no information about any cancellation and made no immediate comment about the story.

Especially after the meeting of Turkish and Syrian Defense Ministers in Moscow, the angry mood among the Syrian rebels spread to the streets as the protestors chanted they would rather die than reconçiliate with Assad regime.

Since then, the areas controlled by Hayyaat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS) and Turkish-backed factions in Idlib, Aleppo and Al-Raqqah experienced public protests, where angry protestors condemned the meeting between Turkish and Syrian officials and rapprochement between Ankara and Damascus and expressed their rejection of the reconciliation of Al-Assad’s regime.

The latest protests took place after Friday prayers on January 6 in Jisr Al-Shughour city in western Idlib and surrounding villages, Qabaseen, Azaz, Al-Ra’i Al-Bab and Suran in the northern and eastern countryside of Aleppo and Tel Abyad in the northern countryside Al-Raqqah.