Branding both the PYD and the YPG as “terrorist organizations”, Recep Tayyip Erdogan told Washington it had to choose between Turkey and, as he put it, the “terrorists” as USA partners.
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His remarks escalated a row between Washington and Ankara over the role of Kurdish fighters in the struggle against Islamic State (IS) jihadists in Syria.
The Turkish security forces said on Wednesday they had seized explosives and four suicide vests in the baggage of a group of suspects stopped at the border in the southeastern town of Karkamis.
Most of those present at the ceremony had ties to the Kurdish Democratic Union Party in Syria (PYD), according to Shamoyev.
Erdogan said: “You failed to know (these groups)”.
In Washington, a State Department spokesman reiterated the longstanding US policy that considers the PKK “to be a terrorist organization”.
Opposition forces supported by Turkey and Saudi Arabia are losing more ground to the troops of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who is backed by Hezbollah militants and Russian airstrikes. “That’s why the region is drenched in blood”. USA officials have recently traveled to northern Syria to meet with YPG members, prompting a strong reaction from Turkey’s president.
The Foreign Ministry summoned US Ambassador John Bass to a meeting in Ankara on Tuesday after the State Department said publicly on Monday that it doesn’t consider the Syrian Kurds to be terrorists.
Erdogan said that Turkish spending on food, accommodation and medical care for 280,000 Syrian refugees living in camps had reached $10 billion, while the United Nations had provided just $455 million. The Daesh Takfiri, who have been wreaking havoc in Syria Iraq and miles further in Libya, were initially trained by the Central Intelligence Agency in Jordan in 2012 to destabilize the Syrian government.
Maj. Yasser Abdul-Rahim, a rebel commander in Aleppo province, told The Associated Press that fighters from the Kurdish People’s Protection Units, known as the YPG, are clashing with rebels near Mannagh air base. Local media reported that three police were wounded. If it is that easy, I am asking you: “We have accepted 3 million people from Iraq and Syria until now, but what did you accept?” he said.
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Syrian Kurdish separatists on Wednesday opened a representation in Moscow amid a push by the Kremlin to have them included in Syria peace talks despite Turkey’s objections.
