ISTANBUL

Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan on Thursday met with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Syrian Foreign Minister Asaad Hassan al-Shaibani on the sidelines of the informal NATO foreign ministers meeting in the Turkish resort city of Antalya.

🇹🇷 | 🇺🇸 Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan meets US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on the sidelines of an informal NATO foreign ministers meeting in Antalya, Türkiye https://t.co/74z2hItR46 pic.twitter.com/Y5cBUEaz0P

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According to Turkish diplomatic sources, trilateral talks included delegations from all three countries and took place at the NEST Congress Center in Antalya.

The meeting, which lasted almost two hours, was extremely “cordial and constructive,” according to the sources.

The meeting addressed topics raised during the Riyadh meeting between US President Donald Trump and Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa, which Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan also attended online.

Expressing Syrians’ desire to live in stability and prosperity, Fidan urged all sides to support the developments moving in the right direction in Syria.

“For this reason, it is important for the US to maintain its engagement with the Syrian administration,” he further said.

Emphasizing that Syria is determined to fight the ISIS (Daesh) terror group, Fidan said that their remaining capacities should not be targeted in order to strengthen this fight.

“Syria is making serious efforts toward the elimination of weapons of mass destruction. Türkiye will continue to do its utmost in this regard,” he added.