Obama says US working with Turkey to stop foreign fighters

ISTANBUL

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U.S. President Barack Obama has said that his country has been working with Turkey and Jordan to stop the flow of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) militants into Syria.

“In combination with the Turks, the Jordanians and others, what we are trying to do is not only shrink the environment in which ISIL can operate, but also to create an environment in which we stop the border flows of foreign fighters into Syria. We’ve made progress there, we need to make more, and that’s where Great Britain’s participation can help,” Obama said in an interview broadcast by BBC July 24.

“But the second part of this is pushing [Syrian President Bashar] Assad, the Russians, the Iranians, into recognising there’s got to be a political transition before Syria pulls the entire region into what could be an even longer and more bloody conflict,” he added.

Click here to read the full transcript of the BBC interview.