Obama To Meet Erdogan In China Over Syria Crisis

MEP: U.S. President Barack Obama is expected to meet his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Sunday during the G20 summit in China to discuss various issues including the Syrian crisis, the White House said on Monday.Obama

The meeting, the first between Obama and Erdoğan since a coup attempt in Turkey failed in July, comes amid differences in strategy against Daesh (ISIS/ISIL) terrorists group. The US has condemned Turkish strikes on opposition groups in Syria, saying they are distracting from the fight against ISIS.

Ben Rhodes, the deputy US national security adviser said “they will be discussing the counter-ISIL campaign and the fact that we need to stay united,” he told reporters in Washington, DC.

It was not certain whether Obama would hold a formal meeting with the Russian president during the G20 summit of the world’s biggest economies, which runs Sept 4-5. But the two leaders often speak on the margins of such summits, Rhodes said.

Obama’s meeting is the latest in a string of high-level US officials’ outreach to Turkish leaders. Last week, Vice President Joe Biden visited Turkey personally.

Meanwhile, US Secretary of Defense Ashton Carter called on Turkey to only focus on Daesh targets.

“We have called upon Turkey… to stay focused on the fight against ISIL and not to engage Syrian Defense Forces, and we’ve had a number of contacts over the last several days,” Carter told reporters.

Tensions between the two allies have risen sharply since then, with Turkey demanding that the United States extradite Fethullah Gulen, an exiled former imam who Ankara claims was behind the coup attempt.

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