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Asharq Al-Awsat
Asharq Al-Awsat
World
Asharq Al-Awsat

Turkey, US Agree to Work Together in Syria

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu shakes hands with US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson in Ankara on Friday. AFP

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said Friday that Turkey and the US agreed to normalize their ties, after weeks of tensions over Ankara's latest cross-border operation in Syria.

US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and Cavusoglu said after talks in Ankara Friday that the two sides would set up working groups to "solve key issues that have bedevilled relations".

"We are not going to act alone any longer, not US doing one thing, Turkey doing another," Tillerson said after the talks.

"We will work together... we have good mechanisms on how we can achieve this, there is a lot of work to be done," he added.

Cavusoglu said that ties were at a "critical phase" and stressed need to create "mechanisms" to discuss the issues that were causing problems.

Washington has warned that Turkey's operation against the People's Protection Units (YPG) Kurdish militia in the Afrin region of Syria risks distracting from the fight against terrorists, AFP reported.

In a joint statement, Washington and Ankara agreed they would "decisively stand against all attempts to create faits accomplis and demographic changes within Syria" as part of their commitment to the preservation of Syria's territorial integrity.

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