Global News

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo briefed NATO ambassadors Friday night on a ceasefire that’s not quite a ceasefire, worked out between allies that are not quite acting like allies.

Pompeo stopped briefly at the alliance headquarters in Brussels on his way back to Washington from a trip to Ankara, where he was sent by President Donald Trump in a bid to contain the disaster in northeastern Syria that has unfolded since Trump effectively gave the green light to a Turkish military offensive against Kurdish forces.

Pompeo and U.S. Vice President Mike Pence met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Thursday, and they said they had secured a deal on a 120-hour ceasefire that would allow Kurdish forces to withdraw from a roughly 30-kilometer zone along the Turkish border.

While Trump has sought to use the halt in hostilities to declare a victory — he called Thursday a “great day for civilization” and proclaimed that “millions of lives will be saved” — in fact the ceasefire has merely cemented Turkey’s invasion and seizure of territory while making the U.S. responsible for ensuring that Kurdish forces withdraw.

Asked about the situation in Syria at a news conference on Friday, European Council President Donald Tusk said: “This so-called ceasefire is not what we expected. In fact, it’s not a ceasefire it’s a demand of capitulation of the Kurds.”