The Russian army has deployed to Tal Tamr, in northern Syria, to protect the population from abuses at the hands of the Turkish army and the PKK/YPG Kurdish militias.

The city of Tal Tamr was annexed by the PKK/YPG to "Rojava", the state devised by the Pentagon in 2013 as part of the plan for redrawing the Middle East. At that point, the PKK-YPF proceeded to push out many Assyrian Christians, who constituted the majority, replacing them with Kurds.

For its part, the Turkish army is destroying all non-Muslim monuments in its path, and consequently the traces of a Christian presence.