Iraqi Kurdish leader meets Erdogan

Iraqi Kurdish leader Massud Barzani was meeting Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan Wednesday, as Ankara was locked in a diplomatic standoff with Baghdad over the deployment of troops in northern Iraq.

With tensions soaring, Turkey urged its citizens to leave all areas of Iraq, excluding Iraqi Kurdistan, due to increased security risks.

After arriving in Ankara, Barzani made an unannounced visit to Turkey's National Intelligence Organisation (MIT) and held talks with spy chief Hakan Fidan, local media reported.

He then entered talks with Erdogan, an official from the president's office told said. He was also to meet Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu later in the evening.

Barzani has long-standing ties with Ankara, and there are multiple Turkish military sites in Iraq's autonomous Kurdish region, of which he is the president.

But there have been growing strains between Ankara and the central Baghdad government over Turkey's deployment of up to 300 soldiers in Bashiqa close to an area held by the Islamic State (IS) group in northern Iraq.
Turkey has described the deployment as a routine rotation to train local Iraqi forces to retake Mosul from IS jihadists.

The Iraqi federal government has told Turkey to withdraw its troops, saying they had entered the country illegally without its consent.

"No-one can say that this (troop deployment) is a surprise," Davutoglu told foreign reporters in Istanbul.

"When the threats increased (to the lightly-armed Turkish trainers), we sent troops to protect the camp. It's not an act of aggression but an act of solidarity."

Davutoglu insisted the troops were there to train local Iraqis to fight against IS jihadists as well as to protect its trainers. But he said the troop transfer had been halted.

"When we saw the reaction (of the Iraqi government) we stopped the transfer."

Davutoglu is expected to visit Baghdad soon with the aim of calming tensions.

- Troops to stay -
Baghdad on Sunday gave Turkey a 48-hour deadline and threatened to appeal to the UN Security Council unless the troops were withdrawn.

Turkey said it had halted further deployment to the Bashiqa area but said there would be no pull-out.

"Our presence (near) Mosul will continue as part of the training programme," Erdogan's spokesman Ibrahim Kalin told reporters in Ankara.

Kalin said the issue could be resolved through dialogue with Iraq.

"The main issue is to support Iraqis in their fight against Daesh," he said using an Arabic acronym for IS.

"It has nothing to do with violation of a country's sovereignty rights."

Authorities say the Turkish army has trained local Iraqis in the Bashiqa area since March, indicating that troops there are not assigned with any combat mission.

Writing on Twitter this week, Brett McGurk, the special US envoy for the anti-IS coalition, said Washington does not support military deployments inside Iraq "absent the consent of the Iraqi government."

"This includes deployment of US military personnel, as well as military personnel from any other country," he wrote.

In its travel warning, Ankara cited increasing threats targeting Turkish companies recently, as well as declarations encouraging violence, abduction and attacks. 
Source: AFP