Thousands of Syrian Kurds fleeing to Iraq to escape Turkish offensive

The five-day long ceasefire agreement negotiated between the U.S. and Turkey has come to an end.This comes as Syrian Kurds flee after losing protection from the United States, its long ally in the region.Hong Yoo reports.Displaced by war, thousands of Syrian Kurds are fleeing to neighboring Iraq to escape Turkey's military offensive.Kurds are the fourth largest ethnic group in West Asia that have never obtained a state for their own.Among them, the Syrian Kurds residing in the northeastern part of Syria are mostly the Syrian Democratic Forces, a force that's part of the YPG militia.Turkey sees them as a terrorist group because of their links to Kurdish insurgents in southeast Turkey.Because of this, Turkey aims to create a 32 kilometer "safe zone" to clear out Kurdish fighters.Kurdish fighters had been protected by the U.S. until President Trump abruptly decided to withdraw a small batch of U.S. troops,... paving the way for Turkey to launch an attack on the SDP on October 9th.Trump's decision faced bipartisan criticism but Trump defended his action saying he was keeping his campaign promise of reducing U.S. troop presence overseas.Then U.S. Vice President Mike Pence was sent to Ankara to negotiate a ceasefire agreement in which the U.S. agreed not to pursue the further imposition of sanctions on Turkey if Ankara promised to stop fighting in the buffer zone.The U.S. had 5 days to withdraw all SDF from the zone until Tuesday 10pm local time.When the truce came to an end, the commander of SDF fighters informed the U.S that all SDF forces had left the areaOn Tuesday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian president Vladimir Putin agreed on a deal in Sochi to remove SDP from the Syria border by deploying Syrian and Russian forces.The forces will then replace the American troops that have guarded the region for years together with the Kurds.Hong Yoo, Arirang News.