President says Ankara does not need to remove troops from Syria to talk with his government.
Syrian President Bashar al-Assad says efforts to mend ties with Turkey had so far brought no tangible results.
“The initiatives did not yield any results worth mentioning despite the seriousness and genuine keenness of mediators,” al-Assad said on Sunday in a speech to the Syrian parliament, referring to recent conciliation efforts by Russia, Iran and Iraq.
Turkey severed ties with Syria in 2011 after the outbreak of the Syrian civil war, in which Ankara supported rebels seeking to oust al-Assad.
The Syrian president and his regime have been accused by international bodies and human rights organisations of committing war crimes after millions of Syrian civilians have fled areas under the control of the government as well as the country as a whole.
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