Turkey will deploy its troops to Qatar for regional security reasons amid the ongoing diplomatic crisis, Qatari Foreign Minister Sheikh Mohammed Bin Abdulrahman Thani said Thursday.
"Turkish troops are coming to Qatar for the sake of the security of the entire region," Thani said at a briefing in Doha.
On Wednesday, the Turkish parliament approved draft legislation allowing the deployment of Turkish troops to Turkey’s military base established in Qatar in 2014 as part of a bilateral defence agreement. The deployment will be carried out in conformity with the 2015 agreement on cooperation between the two countries in the field of security and military training.
Ankara's move comes a day after US President Donald Trump sided with Saudi Arabia in its rift with Qatar and accused Doha of "funding extremism".
On Monday, Saudi Arabia, Bahrain, the United Arab Emirates and Egypt cut off diplomatic relations with Qatar, accusing the latter of supporting terrorist organisations and destabilising the situation in the Middle East. They were later joined by Libya, Yemen, the Maldives, Mauritius and Mauritania, with Jordan and Djibouti announcing they would lower the level of diplomatic contacts with Qatar.
