Turkey’s Erdogan accuses US of backing ‘terrorists’ in Iraq

Turkey has been angered by the American support to Kurdish rebels in Syria.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan accused the United States of supporting Kurdish armed groups that Ankara says executed 13 kidnapped Turks in northern Iraq, adding a US statement of condemnation was “a farce”. “The statement made by the United States is a farce,” Erdogan said on Monday in his first public comments since the killing of 13 Turks, including military and police personnel. “You said you did not support terrorists, when in fact you are on their side and behind them,” Erdogan said in televised remarks criticising the US State Department statement, which failed to accept Ankara’s account of the incident.