Syria campaign over
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson met Turkish leaders yesterday for talks clouded by differences over Syria, a day after Ankara announced the end of its military offensive there.
Tillerson, the most senior US official to visit Turkey since President Donald Trump took office in January, is seeking to turn around recently rocky relations between the Nato allies.
He met with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan for over two hours, after talks with Prime Minister Binali Yildirim and Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu.
The trip comes after Turkey announced "Euphrates Shield", its operation in northern Syria, had ended but did not say if troops had been withdrawn from the war-torn country.
Ties between Ankara and Washington were strained during Barack Obama's administration, particularly over US cooperation with Syrian Kurdish militia fighting against the Islamic State group.
Ankara views the Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) as a "terror group" linked to Kurdish separatists waging an insurgency inside Turkey since 1984, but Washington regards them as the best force fighting IS.
Turkey has suggested it wants to join any operation to capture the IS bastion of Raqa but without involvement of Kurdish militia.
Speaking to NTV television on the eve of Tillerson's visit, Yildirim said the US had not yet informed Turkey if Ankara would take part in a planned Raqa campaign.
"The developments give an impression that the (Trump administration) is following the path of the past administration," he said, referring to the same tensions of the Obama years over the Syrian Kurdish militia role.
The United Nations said yesterday the tally of refugees who have fled the war in Syria now exceeds five million.
"As the number of men, women and children fleeing six years of war in Syria passes the five million mark, the international community needs to do more to help them," the UN refugee agency (UNHCR) said in a statement.
NGOs helping Syrian refugees have regularly sounded the alarm about the crisis, appealing for more funds and international action to end Syria's war.
Meanwhile, Iran strongly denied any meddling yesterday after Arab leaders condemned "foreign interference" in their affairs in a clear reference to the Islamic republic.
Iran has "said repeatedly it does not need to intervene in the domestic affairs of other countries and always abides by the principles of good neighbourliness and respect for the sovereignty of governments," foreign ministry spokesman Bahram Ghasemi said.
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