'US statement on bilateral meeting is misleading'

Turkey criticized Washington on Thursday for its statement on a recent meeting between the Turkish foreign minister and U.S. secretary of state.

"The readout published today by the Department of State and obviously prepared before the meeting held between Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo not only fails to reflect the content of the meeting, but also contains matters that were not even raised during the said meeting," said Foreign Ministry spokesman Hami Aksoy.

Stressing that such incidents had also occurred in the past, Aksoy underlined that the alliance between the two countries naturally required such statements be prepared with "greater care", and that allusion to matters not raised during meetings should be avoided.

On Wednesday, Mike Pompeo and Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu held a closed-door meeting at the U.S. State Department where they discussed bilateral ties and issues of common interest between the two countries.