Erdogan: ''Turkey will not leave Syria until elections are held''

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has said his country will not leave Syria until a general election is held in the war-torn Middle-Eastern nation.

"Whenever the Syrian people hold an election, we will leave Syria to its owners," Erdogan said at the TRT World forum in Istanbul on Thursday.

Turkey sent troops to Syria in August 2016 to clear a border area of fighters belonging to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL, also referred to as ISIS).

It launched another operation earlier this year in the northern Syrian enclave of Afrin to remove Kurdish fighters affiliated with the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK).
Erdogan agreed with President Vladimir Putin of Russia last month to establish a "demilitarised zone" between rebel and government fighters in northern Syria.
The zone, which will have a depth of 15 to 20km will see groups deemed radical by Moscow withdraw from the area by October 15.