Trump praises Turkey’s Erdogan as a friend

U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday praised Turkey’s President Tayyip Erdogan as a friend despite tensions between the two countries over Turkish security officials involved in street fighting with protesters during a visit to Washington in May.

Meeting on the sidelines of the U.N. General Assembly, Trump hailed Erdogan’s leadership in Turkey and said Erdogan “has become a friend of mine.”

“I think now we’re as close as we’ve ever been,” he said.

Eleven people were hurt in what Washington’s police chief described as a brutal attack on peaceful demonstrators outside the Turkish ambassador’s residence. Ankara blamed the violence on groups linked to Kurdish militants fighting an armed campaign in southeastern Turkey.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.