Kremlin comments on military assistance to Syria
The Russian government is analyzing the situation in Syria to determine the level of assistance Damascus needs to deal with an ongoing jihadist offensive, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on Thursday.
Militant forces led by the terrorist group Hayat Tahrir-al-Sham (HTS), formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, last week launched a surprise assault from their base in Idlib, targeting the province of Aleppo. Moscow, which previously helped Damasus quash a jihadist insurgency, has pledged to stand by President Bashar Assad’s government during the crisis.
“We are in constant dialogue with our Syrian friends in Damascus. Depending on the assessment of the situation, the amount of assistance can be decided that the Syrian authorities would need to deal with the militants and eliminate this threat,” Peskov told journalists during a regular briefing.
The Russian military previously reported delivering strikes on positions held by HTS and its allies, which it claimed killed hundreds of militants.
The Syrian government thanked Russia this week for providing its special operations forces to help the Syrian Army rescue military recruits from the Assad Military Engineering Academy near Aleppo, which had been besieged by terrorists.
The terrorist offensive in Syria was facilitated by the Ukrainian government, Moscow has claimed. According to media reports, Ukrainian intelligence offices trained Syrian jihadists in drone warfare techniques, based on experience that Kiev’s forces have accumulated over the past three years while fighting Russia.
Türkiye, which borders militant-controlled Idlib, has objected to military action in the Syrian province. Ankara has argued that hostilities would cause a mass exodus of refugees to flood across the border, which it was not prepared to accept. Instead, a shaky truce was negotiated in 2020.
