Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu slammed American soldiers for wearing the insignia of the YPG, which Turkey classes a terrorist organisation, on their official uniforms during their operations against Daesh in Syria.
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USA special operators serving inside Syria should not have been wearing patches representing an armed Kurdish group as the two forces fight Islamic State militants, a Pentagon spokesman said Friday.
Turkey was further angered by photos of USA soldiers wearing YPG emblems.
His comments followed vociferous complaints from Turkey warning that the apparent demonstration of USA support for a group Turkey regards as a terrorist organization would jeopardize ties between Washington and Ankara.
The PKK has been waging a bloody war against Turkey since 1984 for an autonomous if not an independent Kurdistan in Turkey’s predominantly Kurdish southeast.
To add further fuel to the fire U.S. troops have been seen wearing YPG insignia.
The US is supporting an alliance of Kurdish and Arab fighters, the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), as the most effective fighting force on the ground against IS. Warren said he knew of no additional reprimand or other disciplinary action.
He declined to provide any specifics about their location, but reports suggest they were in or near Fatisah, which was one of three villages that Syrian forces took back from Islamic State militants in recent days. US-backed Syrian fighters and Iraqi forces pressed twin assaults against the Islamic State group, in two of the most important ground offensives yet against the jihadists. But, the USA considers the YPG one of the most capable forces fighting ISIS, and has said it will “reinforce success”.
USA commandos in Syria were this week photographed wearing YPG patches on their uniforms. “We said that we agree, that the second front can be opened, but without the Democratic Union”.
“I can say that Russian Aerospace Forces managed to stop deliveries of smuggled oil from Syria to Turkey nearly entirely”. “The US sees the YPG as a local actor who can be cooperated with in Syria”.
“We are against all terrorist organisations”, he said.
The U.S. and its allies do regard the PKK as a terrorist group, but they do not share that view of YPG.
The terrorist PKK group and the YPG might be connected, the State Department said for the first time Friday.
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Erdogan pledged on Saturday to pursue Turkey’s military operations against the PKK, who he dubbed atheists.
