The Turkish military and allied Syrian forces have taken “total” control of the town centre of Afrin, the target of an offensive against the Kurdish militia. A Kurdish official, Hadia Yousef, said the YPG was still fighting inside the town, but had evacuated the remaining civilians because of “massacres”. But Salih Muslim, a senior Kurdish official living in exile in Europe, tweeted that Kurdish fighters had withdrawn, saying “the struggle will continue and the Kurdish people will keep defending themselves”. The Britain-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said nearly 200,000 people had fled the Afrin region in recent days amid heavy air strikes, entering Syrian government-held territory nearby. Syrian State TV on Sunday broadcast footage of a long line of vehicles and civilians on foot leaving Afrin.

Source: The Irish Times March 18, 2018 15:22 UTC