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Ammon News - AMMONNEWS - Turkish troops and their Syrian rebel allies entered northeast Syria on Wednesday night, the defense ministry said, starting a land offensive against Kurdish militia fighters.

Earlier on Wednesday, Turkish warplanes and artillery pounded Kurdish YPG targets with air strikes and artillery barrages in a cross-border military operation just days after US troops pulled back from the area.

The spokesman for one of the pro-Turkish Syrian militant groups told AFP the land phase of the operation began in Tal Abyad, an area under the control of the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG).

Turkish media said special forces and armored vehicles led the ground invasion and had entered at several points along the border.

“The Turkish Armed Forces and the Syrian National Army have launched the land operation into the east of the Euphrates river as part of the Operation Peace Spring,” the defense ministry announced on Twitter.

Ground assault ‘repelled’, say Syria’s Kurds
The Kurd-led Syrian Democratic Forces said they repelled the Turkish ground offensive on Syria’s northern border, shortly after Ankara announced the land phase of its operation against Kurdish forces had commenced.

“Ground attack by Turkish forces has been repelled by SDF fighters” in the Tal Abyad region, said SDF spokesman Mustefa Bali on Twitter.

*Agencies