Turkish President Tayyip Erdoğan spoke to the Russian press and “asked for permission for an operation on Rojava”, and Abdullah Gül took to bearing false witness and said, “We never wanted Assad to be toppled.”

Erdoğan knocked on Russia’s door to launch a new invasion operation on Rojava-Northern Syria, and in an interview he gave the Izvestiya newspaper, said: “There are negative processes seen in Syria now. If this situation poses a threat to our borders, we will react like we did for the Euphrates Shield operation.”

Erdoğan expressed his discontent with the operation to clear Raqqa of ISIS by saying they are “ready to save Raqqa and Manbij from terrorist groups,” and the US is “betting on the Kurdish groups.”

Former President Abdullah Gül spoke to Russia Today and, bearing false witness for the AKP, said that they “never wanted the government to be toppled in Syria.”

Gül fell back on the Turkish state’s narrative of “We are not against Kurds, we are against the PKK” and claimed: “We must underline this: We are not against Kurds. There are many things connecting us, and we protected them in numerous occasions. In Syria and in Iraq. There are many Syrian Kurdish refugees in Turkey. What we oppose is this: Some Kurdish groups affiliated with the PKK are expanding the territory they control and are forcibly changing the demographics of the region.”