Turkey hits back at Trump threats over Kurds

ANKARA: Turkey on Monday vowed it would not be intimidated by US President Donald Trump´s threats of economic devastation if Ankara attacks Kurdish forces as American troops withdraw.

Trump´s threat came after Ankara repeatedly threatened a new cross-border operation against the Kurdish People´s Protection Units (YPG), which have been working closely with the United States in the war on Islamic State (IS) extremists.

US support to the YPG has been a major source of tension between the NATO allies. "We have said repeatedly we are not scared of and will not be intimidated by any threats," Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said, adding: "Economic threats against Turkey will get nowhere."

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan´s spokesman Ibrahim Kalin earlier said Ankara would "continue to fight against them all", referring to IS and the YPG. Trump on Sunday warned the US would "devastate Turkey economically if they hit Kurds".

While there have been tensions over American training of the YPG under the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) alliance, there appeared to be some improvement on the issue after Trump said last month 2,000 American troops would withdraw from Syria. Ankara welcomed the pullout decision after Erdogan told Trump in a phone call that Turkey could finish off the last remnants of IS.

Trump had also pushed for the creation of a 30-kilometre (20-mile) "safe zone" in his tweet but offered no details. Cavusoglu added that Turkey was "not against" a "security zone" in Syria, during a press conference in Ankara with his Luxembourg counterpart Jean Asselborn.

Turkey views the YPG as a "terrorist offshoot" of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers´ Party (PKK), which has been waging an insurgency against the Turkish state since 1984. The PKK is blacklisted as a terrorist organisation by Ankara, the United States and the European Union. Spokesman Kalin added it was "a fatal mistake to equate Syrian Kurds with the PKK".

There has been growing friction between Turkey and the US over the fate of the YPG, especially after US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo this month said Washington would ensure Turkey would not "slaughter" Kurds.

And before a visit to Ankara last week, White House National Security adviser John Bolton said the US retreat was conditional on the safety of the Kurdish fighters, provoking angry retorts from Turkish officials. But Pompeo on Saturday said he was "optimistic" a way could be found to protect Syrian Kurds while allowing Turks to "defend their country from terrorists".