An explosion in the province of Aleppo

1 Syria

The Syrian news agency SANA reports: At least 5 Turkish servicemen were killed and 12 were injured during a carbomb explosion on late Wednesday evening, in the city of Jarablus, in the eastern Aleppo. The carbomb exploded when a Turkish military convoy was passing nearby. All the victims were evacuated to a hospital in Turkey. No official statements about the incident have been made by Turkey so far.

2 the USA

The White House spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham called the first day of the impeachment hearing in the House Committee on the Judicial Issues to be “a bad day for the Democrats”. The committee concluded the first day of the expert hearing on the impeachment. Jerrold Nadler said that the opinions of the professors reinforce the assumption that the US president abused his powers, and it is the basis for an impeachment. The witnesses, backed by the Democrats, supported the allegations against Donald Trump. The only expert from the Republicans called them ‘superficial’.

3 the USA

The US Secretary of Defense, Mark Esper, during an interview to the ‘Reuters’, announced that the US have completed the process of reduction and relocation of the US military contingent in north-east of Syria. Only 600 US troops will remain in Syria. If necessary, Washington can increase the number of the military personnel. However, Mark Esper didn’t rule out a possible decrease in the number of the US servicemen in Syria, if the European allies send their own military to the region.

4 the NATO

«The NATO must respond to the Ankara’s purchase of the Russian S-400 systems» — said Niels Schmid, a deputy of the Bundestag from the ‘Social Democratic Party of Germany’. «It has become a problem for the NATO. We need a decisive response from the NATO, because we believe that the deployment of the Russian weapons on the Turkish soil threatens the unity of the NATO. We must find a different way to protect the territory of Turkey from missiles» — the RIA NEWS quoted Niels Schmid. He suggested to find a way to deploy American missile defense systems in Turkey. The US Under-Secretary of Defense for the Political Affairs, John Rood, confirmed the US intention to continue to put pressure on Turkey in order to force Turkey to abandon the Russian S-400 AA missile systems.