Internally displaced persons are seen in the town of Inab, eastern Afrin, Syria, on March 16, 2018. Turkish army has taken control of 75 percent of Afrin province in northern Syria, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday. (Xinhua)
ANKARA, March 16 (Xinhua) -- Turkish army has taken control of 75 percent of Afrin province in northern Syria, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday.
"We have taken control of 1,320 square km in Afrin," Erdogan said, speaking at a congress for his ruling party in the northeastern Turkish province of Erzurum.
Ankara and Washington will easily solve the problem in Syria's Manbij region if the United States withdraws Syrian Kurdish militants from the east of the Euphrates River, he said, referring to recent talks between the two NATO allies in order to calm down tensions caused by the U.S. support to the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG).
After finalizing the observer points in Idlib, Turkish army will head to Manbij region, said the president.
Ankara and Washington are negotiating on the situation of Manbij, where the YPG fighters are deployed during their fight against the Islamic State in Syria.
However, Turkey objects Kurdish militia's presence there, saying that the YPG is an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK).
"If the U.S. wants to work with us, it should start with removing the terrorists in the east of Euphrates. We will certainly take those terrorists out," he said, adding that Turkey is open to all kinds of cooperation proposals.
