Excerpt
15 January 2019
Syria war: Turkey ready to create 'safe zone' for Kurds - Erdogan
Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan says he responded positively to Donald Trump's call for a "safe zone" along its border with Kurdish-held Syria.
The leaders spoke by telephone after Mr Trump threatened to "devastate Turkey economically" if it attacked a Kurdish militia when allied US troops withdrew.
Turkey regards the People's Protection Units (YPG) as a terrorist group.
On Tuesday, Mr Erdogan told Turkish MPs he had agreed that a 32km (20-mile) deep safe zone "will be created by us".
There was no immediate response from US officials or the Kurdish authorities who control more than 400km of the Turkish-Syrian border.
- Syrians in Kurdish-held town: 'We are tired of war'
- US withdrawal backs Kurds in a corner
- Who are the Kurds?
However, the US president tweeted on Monday night that he had spoken to Mr Erdogan to "advise where we stand" on the safe zone and efforts to eliminate the remnants of the Islamic State group in eastern Syria with the help of fighters from the YPG-led Syrian Democratic Forces alliance.
"Also spoke about economic development between the US & Turkey - great potential to substantially expand!" he added.
Why does the US want a safe zone?
Last month, the president announced that the US would begin pulling out its 2,000 troops from Syria because IS had been "defeated".
The move shocked allies and drew criticism from US lawmakers. Defence Secretary James Mattis and several other senior officials subsequently resigned.
Opponents of the withdrawal expressed fears that the Turkish military and allied Syrian Arab rebels would launch an offensive to drive YPG fighters away from the border, as they did in the predominantly Kurdish western Afrin region a year ago.
The Turkish government considers the YPG an extension of the banned Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has fought for Kurdish autonomy in Turkey for three decades. However, it denies any direct organisational links to the group.
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