TEHRAN - Foreign Ministry spokesman Abbas Mousavi said on Wednesday that Iran welcomes any action in line with maintaining Syria’s territorial integrity and national sovereignty.

“Iran welcomes any action which results in maintaining territorial integrity, strengthening national sovereignty and restoring peace and stability to the region,” Mousavi said. 

The remarks by the Iranian Foreign spokesman followed after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced on Tuesday that a deal has been reached with Russia for Kurdish fighters to withdraw from a Turkish-ruled “safe zone” in northeast Syria within 150 hours, after which Ankara and Moscow will run joint patrols around the area, Aljazeera reported.

Iran considers the agreement between the Russian Federation and Turkey on ending clashes in northern Syria a positive step to restore peace and stability to the region,” Mousavi noted.

The announcement by Ankara was made after marathon talks in Sochi between Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday, hours before a United States-brokered five-day truce between Turkish and Kurdish-led forces was due to expire.

According to the deal announced at a joint news conference in Sochi, Ankara will control a 32km-wide (20 miles) area between the towns of Tal Abyad and Ras al-Ain, which covers 120km (75 miles) of the Turkish-Syrian border.

Mousavi said, “We hope this agreement would allay Turkey’s security concerns and would also guarantee Syria’s territorial integrity and national sovereignty.”

“The Islamic Republic of Iran has always supported dialogue and peaceful ways to solve problems and has always encouraged talks to reach an agreement. Iran considers the Adana agreement a good basis to ease Syria and Turkey’s concerns and will spare no help to create an agreement between Ankara and Damascus,” he added.

Turkey launched military operations against Syrian Kurdish fighters, known as the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF), in northeast Syria on October 9, arguing they are linked to the PKK (The Kurdistan Workers' Party).

NA/PA