UNITED NATIONS (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 04th February, 2020) United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres urged Russia and Turkey to lower tensions in Syria amid the ongoing escalation, UN spokesperson Stephane Dujarric said in a press briefing on Monday.
The Turkish Defense Ministry announced earlier in the day that five Turkish military personnel and one Turkish civilian had been killed in shelling by Syrian government forces in Idlib. The ministry pledged to take retaliatory action.
"De-escalate," Dujarric said when asked about Guterres' message to the leaders of the two countries.
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and his Turkish counterpart Mevlut Cavusoglu have discussed the escalation of tensions in Idlib and the steps that the guarantor states can take to improve the situation, the Russian Foreign Ministry said in a statement on Monday.
The area surrounding the city of Idlib is one of four nominated de-escalation zones created in Syria by representatives of Russia, Iran and Turkey during talks in Astana (now Nur-Sultan) in May 2017. Idlib is the only de-escalation zone not under the control of the Syrian government, after members of the Hayat Tahrir al-Sham terrorist group (formerly known as Jabhat al-Nusra, banned in Russia) took control of a number of regions in the territory.
