Türkiye on Thursday argued the world shouldn’t be distracted from the deadlock in Syria while other crises take prominence.

"The rise of other large-scale crises should not diminish our attention to Syria, as economic, security and humanitarian aspects of the crisis continue to deteriorate. The status quo is not sustainable," Ahmet Yıldız, Türkiye's envoy to the U.N., told the Security Council.

While the possibility for a lasting political solution is difficult, Yıldız said, "A re-energized focus on Syria is needed."

Syria has been locked in a vicious civil war since early 2011 when the Bashar Assad regime cracked down on pro-democracy protests with unexpected ferocity.

Hundreds of thousands of people have since been killed and more than 10 million others displaced, according to U.N. figures. More than a quarter of Syrians live in extreme poverty, the World Bank says, 13 years into a devastating civil war that has battered the economy and impoverished millions.

"The ground should be prepared to address the root causes of the crisis," Yıldız said. "This requires first and foremost a change of attitude on site of the Syrian regime to initiate genuine national reconciliation."

Urging the council to remain committed to close involvement with the Syrian crisis, Yıldız expressed deep concern about the "significant drop in humanitarian funding, especially at a time when the number of people in need of humanitarian aid has reached a record almost 17 million."

"We call on donors to scale up their contributions," he said.

U.N. agencies and international humanitarian organizations have for years struggled with shrinking budgets, further worsened by the coronavirus pandemic and conflicts elsewhere. The wars in Ukraine and Sudan, and more recently Israel's war with Hamas in the Gaza Strip are the focus of the world's attention.

Also addressing the council, U.N. Special Envoy for Syria Geir Pedersen, too, warned the situation in the war-torn country is "the worst ever."

"You know, we have had 13 years of war and conflict, and never has the situation been as bad as it is today, in particular when it comes to the economy."

The security situation is impacted by what is happening in the Gaza Strip, Pedersen said, warning that there is a "real danger" of further escalation, referring to Israeli airstrikes on what Tel Aviv calls Iranian targets inside Syria but usually have civilian casualties.

International donors led by the European Union this week pledged 5 billion euros ($5.4 billion) for Syria, including 560 million euros for Syrians displaced inside the country and other nations and 1 billion euros for Syrians in Türkiye. At last year’s conference, donors pledged $10.3 billion just months after a 7.8 magnitude earthquake struck Türkiye and much of northern Syria, killing over 59,000 people, including 6,000 in Syria.

YPG occupation

The local residents also suffer from the occupation of the PKK terrorist group’s Syrian branch, the YPG, which took advantage of the power vacuum created by the civil war and seized one-third of Syria under the guise of fighting against Daesh with the support of the U.S. since 2015. It also controls the region’s oil wells – Syria’s largest – and smuggles oil to the Syrian regime despite U.S. sanctions, to generate revenue for its activities.

The Turkish envoy also stressed that "the separatist and disruptive agenda of the terrorist organization, namely PKK/YPG/SDF, as well as its grave violations, reputation and attacks against the local population, continue unabated in Syria."

Emphasizing that the PKK/YPG "has no place in Syria's future," Yıldız urged all parties to "disengage from this terrorist organization, whose only objective is to advance its own separatist agenda."

He expressed Türkiye's commitment to "continue to support international efforts to achieving a lasting settlement."

U.S. forces in Syria regularly train PKK/YPG terrorists in their military bases in the region. Türkiye, which has troops inside Syria and Turkish-backed opposition groups in Syria's northwest, routinely clashes with the PKK/YPG, which seeks to establish a terror corridor along the country's border.

Ankara, which has taken some steps for possible normalization with Damascus last year, has also repeatedly called on its NATO ally to cut off support to the PKK/YPG, something heavily weighing on bilateral relations.

The PKK took up arms against the Turkish state in 1984 and its bloody insurgency for a so-called Kurdish state encompassing Türkiye and Iraq left over 40,000 people dead, including women and children.

Ankara believes the PKK, which is also designated as a terrorist group by the U.S. and the EU, aims to achieve an "autonomous" status first in Syria through the YPG before moving to the next stage of its plan to have an independent state.

The terrorist group, which always promoted itself as a "political party," plans to hold a local "election" in the coming months in a region controlled by the YPG in a bid to cultivate international support but its military backer, the U.S., on Thursday said conditions for "free, fair, transparent and inclusive" elections are not in place in northeastern Syria.

"Any 'elections' that occur in Syria should be free, fair, transparent and inclusive, as it's called for in U.N. Security Council Resolution 2254," State Department spokesperson Vedant Patel told reporters when asked about the YPG plans to hold "local elections" June 11.

President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan on Thursday said Ankara is "closely following the aggressive actions by the terrorist organization against the territorial integrity of our country and of Syria under the pretext of an 'election.'"

"Türkiye will never allow a 'terrorland' just beyond its southern borders in the north of Syria and Iraq," Erdoğan said in an address to the military during the exercise in western Izmir province.

"We did what needed to be done before against the fait accompli, and we will not hesitate to take action again if we encounter the same situation."