Syria ceasefire: Trump tries to turn diplomatic catastrophe into political win
The president seeks to cast a Syria ceasefire as a triumph of diplomacy after criticism from diplomatic and military quarters.
Saturday 23 November 2019 19:18, UK
Donald Trump has announced the United States has brokered a permanent ceasefire in northeast Syria, taking credit for a deal that will be enforced by Turkey and Russia.
The US president said he would lift US sanctions after the Turkish offensive into Kurdish-run areas.
Mr Trump sought to cast this announcement as a triumph of diplomacy after weeks of heavy criticism from diplomatic and military quarters, and even some of his most loyal allies.
It was his decision to withdraw several dozen American troops in the region to clear them from harm's way that effectively gave Turkey a green light for the incursion.
Mr Trump said: "We've done a great job and now we're getting out. This was an outcome created by us and nobody else."
They are words that Kurds may remember for a long time.
The president claimed America had done the Kurds a "great service".
But with 170,000 displaced, as well as children killed and women raped, they've endured heavy losses and continue to face a very uncertain future.
He added: "Let someone else fight over this bloodstained sand."
At the same time as he declared that Kurdish lives would be saved as a result of the ceasefire, it was a stark acknowledgement that lives will inevitably be lost.
Moscow and Ankara may take issue with Mr Trump's insistence that American diplomacy alone was what ended Turkish military operations.
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Leaders Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan spent hours negotiating an agreement in Sochi.
But Mr Trump suggested the US was firmly in the driving seat, saying: "Others have come out to help and we welcomed them to do so, other countries have stepped forward…they want to help and we think that's great."
Russia and Turkey have committed to joint security patrols to force Kurdish fighters from areas they had controlled in Syria.
Mr Erdogan has said the aim was to create a "buffer-zone" to prevent Syrian Kurdish fighters from threatening Turkey's territory and to establish a "safe zone" to resettle Syrian refugees.
The deal and America's withdrawal does mean the US has a significantly diminished stake in the region.
Kurds, who were so crucial in America's fight against IS, will now have to look to Russia as their guarantors.
Republican senator Lindsey Graham, who criticised Mr Trump's initial withdrawal of troops, did express some cautious optimism about the ceasefire.
But he added that any safe zone should not be occupied by Russia or Turkey.
Mr Trump said he has delivered what he promised his supporters - US troops back home and an end to America's engagement in "endless wars".
His address was an attempt to turn a diplomatic catastrophe into a political win - to appeal to those unmoved by the machinations of the Middle East.
He is also seizing on it as proof he's brokered peace. But it's a fragile peace in a deeply fractured region and others are rushing to fill the power vacuum America has helped in part to create.
As Mr Trump spoke, the US envoy to Syria, James Jeffrey, was issuing sobering warnings about IS prisoners who escaped and committed suspected war crimes.