Turkish leader Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Wednesday said he will ignore the delegation sent by President Trump to try to reach a ceasefire in Syria but will instead accept an invitation from Vladimir Putin to travel to Russia.
Erdogan said he will not meet with Vice President Pence and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo when they arrive in Ankara but would sit down with Trump.
“I am standing tall. I will not meet with them,” he told Sky News. “They will meet with their counterparts. I will speak when Trump comes.”
The Turkish president, who has already dismissed calls to negotiate a ceasefire, talked with Putin by phone and agreed to travel to Moscow as soon as the end of October.
In a statement, Putin’s office said the two leaders need to discuss how “to prevent confrontations between units of the Turkish army and Syrian armed forces.”
Kurdish forces that are targeted by Erdogan’s incursion into northern Syria cut a deal with Russia and Syrian President Bashar al-Assad for protection.
The militia group had been a US ally and assisted American troops in the fight against the Islamic State.
Trump, in a phone call earlier this month, told Erdogan he would remove US troops in the region, giving him the go-ahead to launch the invasion.
Ankara considers the Kurds terrorists who are aligned with an insurgent force that has been battling the government inside Turkey for decades.
A defiant Erdogan said his troops will not stop their assault until they complete their mission to create a “safe zone” about 20 miles wide in northeastern Syria.
“We informed the US, EU and Russia before the operation began that … we want this terrorist organization to be removed from our borders,” he said. “When the zone from Manbij to Iraq [is cleared] when we could establish a safe zone, this operation will be over. But until that point, no power can stop us.”
If the Kurds surrender, the incursion will end.
“Our proposal is for the terrorists to lay down their arms, leave their equipment, destroy the traps they have created and leave the safe zone we as designated, as of tonight,” Erdogan said. “If this is done, our Operation Peace Spring will end by itself.”
With Post wires
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