Just Earth News | @justearthnews | 23 Oct 2019, 07:54 pm Print
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Washington (Sputnik/UNI) The United States is lifting all sanctions on Turkey because Ankara informed Washington the ceasefire in Syria would be made permanent, President Donald Trump announced on Wednesday.
"Early this morning, the government of Turkey informed my administration that they would be stopping combat and their offensive in Syria and making the ceasefire permanent, and it will indeed be permanent," Trump said during a press conference. "I’ve therefore instructed the Secretary of the Treasury to lift all sanctions imposed on October 14. So the sanctions will be lifted unless something happens that we're not happy with."
Following Trump’s announcement, US Treasury Department's Office of Foreign Assets Control said in a statement that it has removed Turkey's ministers of Interior, Defense and Energy from its sanctions list.
On October 15, Trump signed an executive order authorizing sanctions against Turkey following the launch of the military operation, dubbed "Peace Spring," in the northern part of Syria against the Islamic State (terrorist organization banned in Russia) and US-allied Kurdish militia, which Ankara designates as terrorists.
Sanctions covered several Turkish institutions and officials, including the Defense Ministry and its head Hulusi Akar, the Energy Ministry and its head Fatih Donmez, and Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu.
Turkey and the United States reached an agreement on October 17 for a five-day ceasefire in northeast Syria to allow for the withdrawal of the Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) from the border area.
As the five-day ceasefire ended, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin reached a deal late on Tuesday to pull the Kurdish forces back and establish joint patrols in a safe zone close on the Turkish border in northeast Syria.
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