The co-chair of the Manbij Legislative Council rebutted claims that Turkish forces will enter the mainly Arab Syrian city under the terms of a road map agreed between Turkey and the United States. Speaking to the pro-Kurdish Hawar News Agency, Farouk Al-Mashi said, “What they claim about the road map regarding their entry to Manbij is nothing but baseless allegations.” The official stated that the situation in Manbij was stable and that Turkey was seeking “pretexts” to intervene in the northern Syrian city.

Al-Mashi was responding to a Sept. 21 statement by Turkish presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin about the implementation of the Manbij road map endorsed in June to pacify Turkish concerns about the dominance of the pro-Syrian Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) over Manbij.

Kalin claimed that Turkey and the United States were on the verge of launching joint patrols in Manbij, saying, “The work on joint patrols in the Manbij area is almost complete. The Turkish Armed Forces coordinates this on the ground with its American counterparts. Those patrols and joint training will begin soon.” He added that it was unacceptable that the United States was pursuing its partnership with the YPG.

Turkey equates the YPG with the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), the Kurdish rebel group that is fighting for self-rule inside Turkey and accuses the United States of reneging on its promise to evacuate the YPG once Manbij was liberated from the Islamic State in August 2016. Lying to the west of the Euphrates River, Manbij is in Turkish eyes a bridgehead for the YPG to link up the vast swath of territory it controls east of the river with the mainly Kurdish enclave of Afrin bordering Turkey. It is one of the main reasons Turkey invaded northern Syria, seizing control in turn of Jarablus, al-Bab and more recently Afrin.