Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Tuesday that his country will patrol to the north of a security corridor being set up around a highway in northwest Syria’s Idlib province while Russia will patrol the southern side.
Agreement on the corridor was part of a ceasefire deal reached by Turkey and Russia last week to halt a conflict in Idlib.
The two countries back opposing sides in Syria’s nine-year war, with Moscow supporting President Bashar al-Assad and Turkey backing some rebel groups.
The conflict so far has displaced nearly a million people in three months.
A Russian military delegation arrived in Ankara on Tuesday for talks on details of the accord, Cavusoglu said in an interview with state-owned Anadolu news agency.
The specifics of the corridor, stretching 6 km north and south of the east-west M4 highway, are due to be agreed within seven days of the deal, Reuters reported.
Under the agreement, joint Turkish-Russian patrols were to begin along the highway itself on March 15. It was not clear what would happen to the pocket of rebels which it will create to the south of the highway.
Cavusoglu said Russia would ensure that Syrian regime forces do not try to enter the corridor along the M4 and that Turkey-back rebels would remain in place.
