Kilis

Turkish citizenship will be granted to a total of 7,000 Syrians after months of work on the issue.

Preparatory work on the issue was completed two weeks ago and the executive order on granting citizenship to 7,000 Syrians was presented and opened to signing in the cabinet meeting. 

There is a rise in the number of reports claiming that disagreements between Syrians and Turkish people have recently escalated amid several incidents across the country. Top officials are calling for an ease of such incidents, urging all to live in peace together.

Tens of thousands of Syrians have returned to Syria from Turkey to celebrate Eid al-Fitr at home after years spent in Turkey amid the war in their homeland. 

Some 110,000 Syrians crossed the border after waiting for hours amid blazing heat to return to their houses, daily Milliyet reported on June 25. 

A total of 10,657 militants of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) were "neutralized" in the last two years, according to Turkish Defense Minister Fikri Işık. He said that with the operations, the PKK has become "unable to carry out attacks."

Some 18 people were detained in simultaneous raids around Istanbul over alleged links to the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) on June 11, Doğan News Agency has reported.

Anti-terrorism police raided 19 different addresses in 11 districts in Istanbul early on June 11 as part of an investigation into the jihadist group. 

The southeastern border province of Kilis is home to the largest percentage of Syrian migrants in Turkey, according to figures released by the Turkish Interior Ministry's Directorate General of Migration Management. 

The ministry said some 95.15 percent of Kilis' population is made up of Syrian migrants. 

A basilica, which was unearthed 18 years ago during illegal excavations in the southeastern province of Kilis and is home to 1,600 year-old mosaics, is set to open to tourism. 

A second group of Syrian police officers trained in Turkey as part of a joint initiative by Turkish forces and Free Syrian Army (FSA) factions has started to return to Syria.

Turkey will not hand over control of Al-Bab to the Bashar al-Assad regime after it clears the town of Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) jihadists, Deputy Prime Minister Kurtulmuş has stated.

"Al-Bab belongs to the people of Al -Bab," Kurtulmuş told state-run Anadolu Agency, stressing that local people must be in charge of running the town, as in Jarablus.  

Nine Ankara-backed Free Syrian Army (FSA) rebels were transferred to the southern Turkish province of Gaziantep from neighboring Kilis, on suspicion that they carried the symptoms of being a victim of a chemical attack, Doğan News Agency reported late on Nov. 27.