Turkey says Kurdish militant banner in Raqqa shows US sided with terrorists
Turkey said on Friday that a huge banner of jailed Kurdish militant leader Abdullah Ocalan unfurled in central Raqqa by US-backed Kurdish forces would further harm already fraught relations between Ankara and Washington.
The banner of Ocalan was raised on Thursday at a ceremony to mark Raqqa's capture from Islamic State in a campaign spearheaded by Kurdish Syrian YPG fighters, with military support from the United States.
Turkey considers the YPG to be an extension of Ocalan's Kurdistan Worker's Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency in Turkey's southeast and is designated a terrorist organisation by the United States, European Union and Turkey.
Ankara says that weapons supplied to fighters in Syria have ended up in PKK hands, threatening Turkish security.
