Turkish forces, allied militants intend to steal wheat crops in Syria’s Hasakah: SANA

Turkish military forces and allied militants are reportedly planning to steal tens of tons of grain from Syria’s northeastern province of Hasakah, and smuggle it across the border.

Syria’s official news agency, citing local sources, reported on Tuesday that Turkish troops and their allies had brought in a number of combine harvesters to the key border town of Ra's al-Ayn in order to reap wheat crops and seize them later.

The sources added that Turkish military forces and allied militants have already stolen more than 15 percent of wheat production in the region following threats of setting fire to farming lands in case local residents did not comply with their arbitrary measures.

Turkish-backed militants were deployed to northern Syria last October after Turkish military forces launched a long-threatened cross-border invasion in a declared attempt to push the Kurdish People's Protection Unit (YPG) militants away from border areas.

Turkish-backed militants set fire to farms in northeastern Syria: SANA

Turkish-backed Takfiri militants burn wide areas of agricultural lands in Syria’s northeastern province of Hasakah, reports say.

Ankara views the US-backed YPG as a terrorist organization tied to the homegrown Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has been seeking an autonomous Kurdish region in Turkey since 1984.

On October 22 last year, Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, signed a memorandum of understanding that asserted the YPG militants had to withdraw from the Turkish-controlled "safe zone" in northeastern Syria within 150 hours, after which Ankara and Moscow would run joint patrols around the area.

US dispatches trucks loaded with military equipment to Hasakah

Separately, a convoy of several trucks crossed the Waleed border crossing on Tuesday and headed toward US positions in al-Ya'rubiyah town of Hasakah province, local sources told SANA.

The sources added that six armored vehicles also entered the Syrian territory though the Iraqi border village of al-Mahmoudiyah, and headed to oil wells that are under the control of US soldiers.

Syria vows fight against ‘American, Turkish, Israeli occupiers’

Syria’s UN ambassador tells the Security Council that any foreign military presence in the Arab country without Damascus’ consent amounts to ‘occupation and aggression.’

Since late October 2019, the US has been redeploying troops to the oil fields controlled by Kurdish forces in eastern Syria, in a reversal of President Donald Trump’s earlier order to withdraw all troops from the Arab country.

The Pentagon claims the move aims to “protect” the fields and facilities from possible attacks by the Daesh Takfiri terrorist group. That claim came although Trump had earlier suggested that Washington sought economic interests in controlling the oil fields.

Syria, which has not authorized American military presence in its territory, has condemned the US, saying it is “plundering” the country’s oil.

The presence of US forces in eastern Syria has particularly irked the civilians, and local residents have on several occasions stopped American military convoys entering the region.  

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