Former envoy to Syria says US ignores Turkiye security concerns in the region

Robert Ford, the last US Ambassador to Syria said the United States’ support for the PKK terrorist group and its Syrian offshoot, the YPG, in Syria prevails as a major irritant in Turkish-US relations, Anadolu Agency reports.

According to the report, Ford says Washington does not understand Turkiye’s security concerns in Syria’s north, where the terrorist group holds swathes of land. Ford says Washington considers the situation a “security problem” when it is actually a “political problem”.

“I think Washington, in general, and also many analysts in Washington, do not understand the extent of anger which American relations with the YPG causes generates in Turkiye,” Ford, who was the US Ambassador to Syria between 2011 and 2014, told Anadolu Agency (AA) in an interview.

The PKK has continued a campaign of terror against Turkiye for more than 35 years and has been responsible for the deaths of more than 40,000 people.

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