Turkish-US Syria talks set to resume amid heightened tensions
Turkish diplomats will meet in Washington tomorrow, hoping to build on what Ankara has said are US pledges to push Syrian Kurdish fighters out of Manbij in northern Syria.
Turkish and US officials were expected to resume talks on Syria in Washington tomorrow in an effort to ease tensions over Syria amid repeated warnings from Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to expand operations against a Syrian Kurdish militia allied with the United States.
Turkish officials aired cautious optimism that its delegation, led by Foreign Ministry Undersecretary Umit Yalcin, would come away with enough to pave the way for a visit by Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu to Washington soon after to finalize a deal on Manbij.
"I think that Turkish-US relations will be better in the days to come," said Volkan Bozkir, the head of the Turkish parliament’s foreign affairs committee and a member of Erdogan’s ruling Justice and Development Party.
Turkish diplomats apparently hope to build on what Cavusoglu earlier described as US pledges to push the Syrian Kurdish militia known as the People’s Protection Units (YPG) out of the predominantly Arab town of Manbij.
