Assad says Turkey rapprochement doesn't depend on troop withdrawal

President Bashar al-Assad said Sunday the withdrawal of Turkish forces from its territory was not a pre-requisite to a rapprochement between the estranged neighbours.

"It's not correct what was announced by some Turkish officials recently, that Syria said if there is no withdrawal, it will not meet with the Turks," Assad told parliament on Sunday.

"This talk is far from reality," he added. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan supported early rebel efforts to topple Assad after civil war broke out in the country in 2011, but reversed course in recent years. Since 2022, top Syrian and Turkish officials have met for Russia-mediated talks, with Moscow pushing for a detente.

Turkish troops and Turkey-backed rebel factions control swathes of northern Syria, and Ankara has launched successive cross-border offensives since 2016, mainly to clear the area of the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF). Turkey sees the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG), which dominate the SDF, as an offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which it considers a "terrorist" group.

In July, Erdogan said he might invite Assad to Turkey "at any moment", in a sign of reconciliation. Assad said later that month he was open to meeting Erdogan but it depended on the encounter's "content", noting Turkey's presence in Syria was a key sticking point.

Syria's war began after the repression of anti-government protests in 2011 and has killed more than 500,000 people and displaced millions.

Turkey hosts some 3.2 million Syrian refugees out of a population of 85 million, according to United Nations data. Their future regularly comes up in Turkish political debate, with some opponents of Erdogan promising to send them back to Syria.