Erdoğan says Turkish prosecutor asked Saudi counterpart who sent Khashoggi's killers

The Turkish prosecutor looking into the death of Jamal Khashoggi has asked Saudi Arabia's prosecutor to say who sent the team involved in the journalist's killing, President Tayyip Erdoğan said on Tuesday.

Speaking to reporters in parliament, Erdoğan said the Turkish prosecutor had told his Saudi counterpart that the 18 suspects in the case could be tried in Turkey. Saudi officials also needed to reveal the identity of a local cooperator said to have been involved in Khashoggi's disappearance, he said.

Saudi Arabia's Chief Prosecutor Saud Al Mojeb on Tuesday arrived at the Consulate of Saudi Arabia in Istanbul as part of probe into slain journalist Jamal Khashoggi.

He had previously visited his Turkish counterpart at the Çağlayan Courthouse.

Khashoggi, a Washington Post columnist and a critic of Saudi Arabia's Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, was killed inside the Consulate of Saudi Arabia in Istanbul after he went there to obtain documents for his forthcoming marriage.

After denying any involvement in the disappearance of Khashoggi, 59, for two weeks, Saudi Arabia on Oct. 20 acknowledged his death, saying he had died in a fistfight.

Since then, Saudi Arabia’s public prosecutor said Khashoggi’s killing was premeditated, contradicting the previous official statement that it happened accidentally during a tussle in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

He also said that Turkey will destroy terror structures in the east of the Euphrates River in Syria, adding that the intervention there had begun and more extensive operations will be launched soon.

"We will walk over terror groups with more effective operations."

The Turkish Armed Forces (TAF) on Sunday bombed positions belonging to terrorists of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK)’s Syrian affiliate, the YPG, on the eastern shore of the Euphrates River in Syria.

Artillery shells were fired at the YPG-occupied Zour Magyar to the west of northern Syria's Ayn al-Arab region and was aimed at preventing terrorist activities.

He said that Turkey would bring down all terror nests on the eastern side of Euphrates. "We have finished all our preparations, plans, program regarding the issue," he added.

He said that Turkey cannot "look to the future with confidence without solving the Syrian issue".

Syria has only just begun to emerge from a devastating conflict that began in 2011 when the Assad regime cracked down on demonstrators with unexpected ferocity.

The powers using terror groups as tools to reach their goals are trying to revive Daesh in Syria, Erdoğan warned.

But, he said, Turkey would never allow them to drag Syria into chaos and bloodshed by inciting the regime or reviving Daesh in the region.

"Neither people in the region nor the world believe in the Daesh game," said Erdoğan.

More than 300 people lost their lives in Daesh-claimed attacks in Turkey, where the terror organization has targeted civilians in suicide bomb, rocket, and gun attacks in recent years.