Turkish Interior Minister Besir Atalay called on United States to take responsibility for issues regarding Iraq, the semi-official Anatolia news agency reported on Sunday.
"United States has responsibilities on matters regarding Iraq, especially the PKK issue, it should fulfill requirements of this responsibility," Atalay was quoted as saying.
He noted that the U.S. responsibility is inevitable as its troops are in the forefront of the coalition forces' mission in Iraq.
Atalay made the remarks just a day before the upcoming meeting between Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and U.S. President George W. Bush in Washington.
The meeting is widely believed to be vital in determining whether Turkey will launch military incursion into northern Iraq or not.
The United States has been trying to dissuade Turkey from a military resort toward the northern Iraq-based separatist Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK).
Turkey has now massed up to 100,000 troops along the mountainous border with Iraq in preparations for a cross-border operation to crush about 3,000-strong PKK rebels based there in the light of a motion approved by the parliament earlier this month.
The PKK, listed by the United States and Turkey as a terrorist group, took up arms against Turkey in 1984 with the aim of creating an ethnic homeland in the southeast.
More than 30,000 people have been killed in the more than two decades conflict.
Source: Xinhua
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