AKIPRESS.COM - Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday called the Iraqi Kurdish independence referendum illegitimate and said Russia and Turkey agreed that the territorial integrity of Iraq and neighbouring Syria must be preserved, Reutersreported.

Erdogan spoke after face-to-face talks in Ankara with President Vladimir Putin. The Russian leader gave no opinion of the vote, saying Moscow’s position had been set out by the foreign ministry which said it respected the Kurds’ “national striving” but supported the sovereignty, unity and territorial integrity of Iraq.

Both Turkey and Russia have strong commercial ties with the semi-autonomous Kurdish region of north Iraq but Turkey - with a large Kurdish population of its own - bitterly criticised Monday’s referendum, threatening economic sanctions and a military response.

“The Kurdish referendum has no legitimacy in terms of the Iraqi constitution and international laws,” Erdogan said in his comments at the presidential palace.

“No one has the right to throw our region in the fire. In this delicate period after the referendum, we have to prevent the Kurdish Regional Government from making bigger mistakes.”

Turkey has been battling an insurgency in its mainly Kurdish southeast for more than three decades and fears the vote in northern Iraq could fuel separatism within its own borders.

Both Erdogan and Putin said they would continue to work together to address the conflict in Syria, where they have supported opposing sides in the struggle between President Bashar al-Assad’s government and rebels who fought to overthrow him.