Several media reported that 33 Turkish service members were killed in a Syrian airstrike on the Greater Idlib region on 27 February 2020.
Valisi Dogan, governor of the southern Turkish province of Hatay said that many other service members were injured in the Syrian airstrikes. Hatay is the Turkish province bordering Idlib.
According to anti-government sources, a convoy of Turkish forces near the towns of al-Bara and Baluon was the target of the deadly airstrikes.
Turkish media reported that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan hold a six-hour-long emergency security meeting following the air strike on Turkish soldiers.
The crisis in Idlib has escalated dramatically in the recent weeks when Syrian government waged large-scale offensive against anti-government forces to reclaim strategic towns. As a result, Turkey sent thousands of its own troops and hardware there since more than a million Syrians have taken shelter near the Turkish border due to the Syrian civil war. Turkey has taken in some 3.7 million Syrians who fled their country from the civil war that started in 2011, making it the world’s top refugee-hosting country.