Turkey to train Iraqi police forces

Turkey will provide training for Iraqi police as part of the cooperation in fighting the Islamic State (IS) threat in the neighboring country, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Tuesday.

Speaking at a joint press conference with visiting Iraqi Foreign Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari in Ankara, Cavusoglu pledged Turkey's continuous support to Iraq in the fight against the IS, an al-Qaida offshoot which took control of some of the country's predominantly Sunni provinces.

Cavusoglu recalled that Turkey has provided training for more than 1,600 Kurdish Peshmerga forces as well as more than 1,500 national guards in Mosul, along with providing military equipment to the Iraqi army, as part of the efforts to defeat the IS in Iraq.

Turkey has also set up three refugee camps in northern Iraq for more than 40,000 people fleeing IS threat in the country.

Despite month-long air strikes by the U.S.-led coalition, the IS made more advances after taking the control of Ramadi, the capital city of Anbar province, and seizing around a third of the ancient city of Palmyra at the end of May.