ANKARA, Turkey (AP) - U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson met Turkish leaders on Thursday, a day after Turkey said it has ended a military operation in northern Syria amid differences with the United States over how to fight the Islamic State group there.
Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said late Wednesday that Operation Euphrates Shield had ended after its troops and allied rebels secured territory along the border between Turkey and Syria.
“Syrians from Turkey have returned. Life is back to normal. Everything is under control,” Yildirim said on Turkey’s NTV news channel. “Euphrates Shield has ended. If there is a need, a new operation will have a new name.”
Yildirim has previously said that the United States risks major damage to its relationship with NATO ally Turkey if the U.S. includes Kurdish forces in the fight to retake Raqqa, the Islamic State group’s de facto capital. Raqqa is southeast of the Syrian area that Turkish troops have occupied.
Turkey has pressed the United States to mount a joint fight to retake Raqqa and wants U.S.-backed Syrian Kurdish fighters to be excluded from the operations.
Turkish authorities consider the Syrian Kurdish force known as the YPG to be a terrorist group that threatens Turkey’s security.
Tillerson was scheduled to meet President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on Thursday.
Other issues likely to come up in the talks are Turkish requests for the extradition of U.S.-based Muslim cleric Fethullah Gulen, accused of staging a failed coup attempt last year. Gulen has denied involvement.
Cavusoglu said Turkey would also take up the issue of the arrest in New York of a senior executive of Turkish state-owned bank Halkbank. The executive is accused of helping Iran violate U.S. sanctions against the country.
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