Trump’s senior advisor visits Turkey amid tensions
Washington: The White House said on Sunday that a senior advisor of US President Donald Trump visited Turkey on February 10 and 11 amid escalating tensions of the two NATO allies over Turkey's attack in Afrin, Syria.
Citing a White House statement, Xinhua reported that H.R. McMaster, Trump's National Security Advisor, met with Ibrahim Kalin, Deputy Secretary General and Spokesperson of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan in his visit to Istanbul.
During their meeting, Kalin and McMaster affirmed the bilateral strategic partnership and discussed the "priorities and concerns" and common strategic challenges of both countries, said the White House.
It added that they addressed issues affecting bilateral relations in detail and explored ways to expand the joint fight against all forms of terrorism.
US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson will also visit Turkey next week in his Middle East trip and US Secretary of Defense James Mattis is also due to meet his Turkish counterpart Nurettin Canikli in Brussels.
Relations between Washington and Ankara have been highly strained, in part due to US support for the the People's Protection Units (YPG) in Syria.
Turkey sees the YPG as Syrian offshoot of the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which is designated as a terrorist group by Turkey, the US and the EU.
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India, China decide to resume Kailash Mansarovar Yatra
New Delhi, Jan 27 (PTI): India and China on Monday decided to resume the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra as the two sides agreed to take certain people-centric steps to "stabilise and rebuild" ties.
The Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said this following Foreign Secretary Vikram Misri's talks with his Chinese counterpart Sun Weidong in Beijing.
It said the two sides also agreed in principle to resume direct air services between the two countries.
"As agreed between Prime Minister Narendra Modi and President Xi Jinping at their meeting in Kazan in October, the two sides reviewed the state of India-China bilateral relations comprehensively and agreed to take certain people-centric steps to stabilize and rebuild ties," the MEA said.
"In this context, the two sides decided to resume the Kailash Mansarovar Yatra in the summer of 2025," it said.
The MEA said the two sides also agreed to hold an early meeting of the India-China expert level mechanism to discuss resumption of provision of hydrological data and other cooperation pertaining to trans-border rivers.
It said the two sides agreed to take appropriate measures to further promote and facilitate people-to-people exchanges, including media and think-tank interactions.
"They agreed in principle to resume direct air services between the two countries; the relevant technical authorities on the two sides will meet and negotiate an updated framework for this purpose at an early date," the MEA said.
