As results come in from the Kurdistan Regional Government's referendum on independence from Iraq, Baghdad is rejecting the vote as illegitimate and refusing all talks on the matter. Turkey has threatened to seal the KRG's borders. One deadly clash was reported between Kurdish Peshmerga and a Turkmen militia at a town contested between Baghdad and the KRG.
A Turkish court ordered the release of Peoples' Democratic Party (HDP) parliamentarian Ayhan Bilgen, who had been jailed over allegations of terrorism. The release followed a "Conscience and Justice Watch" at the Constitutional Court building to demand action for those they believed were unjustly and unlawfully imprisoned.
Days after again vowing that Ankara will not tolerate a Kurdish state in Syria, Turkey beefed up artillery and tanks along the border, signaling an imminent offensive to take the Kurdish-held enclave of Afrin. This could be the start of a wider Turkish offensive—reportedly to be dubbed “Euphrates Sword”—to reduce or expunge the Kuridsh autonomous zone of Rojava and establish a Turkish “buffer zone” in Syria’s north. Ominously, Russia has meanwhile mobilized troops to Afrin, to back up the Kurdish militia that controls the enclave.
A Turkish court ordered that six human rights activists, including Amnesty International’s Turkey director Idil Eser, remain in custody pending trial for allegedly aiding an armed terrorist group. Amnesty issued a statement rejecting the “bizarre accusations” and charging the Turkish state with a “politically motivated witch-hunt.”
The full liberation of Mosul from ISIS has been declared, but at a terrible cost in human lives—and multiple contradictions among the alliance assembled to take the city could open a new war in Iraq's north.
Civil resistance is mounting to the consolidating dictatorship in Turkey, with thousands marching cross-country from Ankara to Istanbul and protests emerging to Erdogan's power-grab.
The UN reports a “notable trend of spontaneous returns” of displaced Syrians as regime gains bring a modicum of peace to some areas—but mass killings by regime forces continue.
With the Syrian Kurds now facing open war from both Turkey and the Assad regime, the imminent taking of Raqqa portends a multi-sided scramble for former ISIS territory.
Turkish government claims that Kurdish rebels in the country's east are profiting from the hashish trade point to an integrated counter-insurgency and drug enforcement campaign.
Clashes broke out between Syrian rebel factions and Kurdish fighters in Aleppo province, as Arabs and Kurds are further pitted against each other by Great Power manipulation.
Authorities in Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region announced that a referendum on independence will be held in September—drawing immediate harsh criticism from Baghdad.
After Kurdish guerillas attacked an Iranian border patrol, Tehran blamed Turkey for failing to prevent "terrorist" infiltration—even as Turkey is building a security wall along the frontier.
