US Defense Secretary Jim Mattis urged Turkey to remain focused on fighting ISIS in Syria as tensions mount between the two NATO allies over Ankara's operation against Kurds, a Pentagon statement on Thursday said.
Mattis made the remark during a meeting with his Turkish counterpart Nurettin Canikli late Wednesday on the sidelines of a NATO meeting in Brussels.
"He called for a renewed focus on the campaign to defeat ISIS, and to preventing any vestige of the terrorist organization from reconstituting in Syria," the statement said.
Relations between the US and Turkey have become frayed by their diverging interests in the Syrian civil war.
Washington is focused on defeating ISIS while Ankara, keen to prevent Syria’s Kurds from gaining autonomy and fueling Kurdish insurgents on its soil, last month launched a military incursion into the Afrin region of northern Syria to sweep the Syrian People's Protection Units (YPG), which Turkey blacklists as a terror group but which is closely allied with the US in the battle against militants.
"Mattis acknowledged the legitimate threats posed to Turkey’s national security by terrorist organizations," the statement said.
But he "also discussed the complex security environment in Syria, and the danger that a resurgent ISIS could pose to all NATO allies."
It said Mattis and Canikli "agreed to continue their full range of bilateral and multilateral defense activities and consultations, and to look for ways to further strengthen defense cooperation in the future."
