Ankara is gravely concerned by photos of USA soldiers attending the funerals of Syrian Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) militants, who it says are linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), in the wake of Turkish air strikes on the two groups, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said.
Turkish forces last week carried out air strikes on YPG positions in Syria, angering the United States and sparking days of border clashes with the Kurdish fighters.
Al Jazeera's Hashem Ahelbarra, reporting from Gaziantep along the Turkey-Syria border, said United States troops have patrolled the area in what appears to be an attempt to de-escalate the situation between the Turkish military and YPG.
The Turkish government is pressuring Washington to stop backing Kurdish fighters as an ally in the fight against ISIL militants in Syria, in a dispute that has limited cooperation between the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation allies. While we are fighting and dying side by side with the USA military in the campaign against the Islamic State, Erdogan is turning a blind eye to terrorism and supporting groups that overtly espouse jihadist ideals. Kurdish officials describe the USA troop movement as a "buffer" between the Kurds and Turkey.
Forty terrorists were killed at Iraq's Mt. Sinjar, and another 49 at Syria's Mt. Karacok in April 25 airstrikes by Turkish forces against the PKK and its Syrian offshoots, PYD and YPG.
The Kurdish outlet Rudaw published a video Friday of military vehicles with American flags traveling through Darbasiyah, northeast Syria, by the Turkish border.
It said the YPG "is indispensable" to defeat IS but there is also "no avoiding the fact" that the USA is backing a force "led by PKK-trained cadres in Syria while the PKK itself continues an insurgency against a North Atlantic Treaty Organisation ally".
Several photos of USA service personnel on armored vehicles in the area have appeared on Twitter. The private Ihlas news agency reported the convoy was heading to southeastern Sanliurfa province from Kilis in the west. The shelling hit near Darbasiya, a town in a Kurdish-controlled part of northeast Syria.
The airstrikes reportedly targeted Christian and Yazidi communities in Syria and Iraq, alleging that the regions were aiding and abetting the USA -designated terrorist group Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which was also targeted in the raid.
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Turkey's military said it killed 14 members of the militant Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) in air strikes in northern Iraq on Saturday, as Ankara steps up a push against the group and their affiliates in Iraq and Syria.
The attacks on the YPG, a key member of a US-backed militia fighting Islamic State in Syria, have further complicated Turkey's relations with Washington.
Just days after 20 Kurdish fighters assisting USA troops were killed by a Turkish airstrike, Trump has sent armed vehicles to the same location.
The Turkish airstrikes also wounded 18 members of the USA -backed People's Protection Units, or Y.P.G., were criticized by both the US and Russian Federation.
The area, which includes Arbin, has been held under siege by government forces for more than three years.
The AP quotes Col. John Dorrian, "a USA spokesman for the worldwide coalition against" the Islamic State, as calling the deployment of American troops to the area "ongoing". But Turkey regards the militias as a direct offshoot of a Kurdish militant group that poses a grave threat to Turkish security.
His comments came amid rising tensions over the weekend along the border, with both Ankara and Washington moving armoured vehicles to the area.
"The huge America, the coalition and Turkey can join hands and turn Raqa into a graveyard for Daesh", Recep Tayyip Erdogan told an Istanbul meeting, using an alternative name for the IS group.
Turkey remains adamantly opposed to Kurdish militia playing a role in the Raqqa campaign, and have instead floated the idea of Turkish-backed Syrian rebel forces joining the fight to liberate Raqqa.
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