Turkey-Syria: press, rebels possibly behind mortar fire

Turkish daily Cumuriyet today raised the suspicion that anti-Assad Sunni rebels rather than government forces could be behind at least some of the Syrian mortar strikes against Turkey in the last few days. Cumuriyet said that many people who crossed in the past week the border between Akcakale in Turkey and the Syrian town of Tel Abayad said Turkey's retaliatory artillery strikes hit targets now held by rebels. Militia with the Free Syrian Army (ESL) conquered two weeks ago the border crossing of Tal Abayad and occupied posts formerly controlled by government forces. The Turkish army said it responded to Syrian mortar fire by following its radars and aiming guns against the locations which had originally fired, raising the suspect that Syrian cross-border shelling could have been fired by rebels, according to Cumuriyet.