GOVERNMENT troops raised the Syrian flag in the Kurdish stronghold of Manbij today after taking control of the city to defend it from a threatened Turkish invasion.

President Bashar al-Assad’s forces entered Manbij after being invited by the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG) following last week’s announcement of the withdrawal of US troops.

Turkish forces have been building up around the city with President Recep Tayyip Erdogan indicating that a ground assault alongside 15,000 soldiers from the jihadist Free Syrian Army was imminent.

Ankara deems the YPG to be an offshoot of the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) with Mr Erdogan pledging to clear the area of “terrorists.”

“We invite the Syrian government forces to assert control over the areas our forces have withdrawn from, in particularly Manbij, and to protect these areas against a Turkish invasion,” a YPG statement said.

The move was welcomed by Moscow with spokesman Dmitry Peskov saying: “Of course, this will help in stabilising the situation. The enlargement of the zone under the control of government forces... is without doubt a positive trend.”

However Mr Erdogan dismissed the move as a “psychological operation” and said the situation remained unclear.

Kurdish officials visited Moscow for talks last week seeking support in maintaining their territory in northern Syria including the de facto semi-autonomous region known as Rojava.

Russia could act as a mediator between Mr Assad’s government and Kurdish officials regarding longer term arrangements for the governance of the region.

Officials from the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) first met with the Syrian government in June and talks have been ongoing. SDF spokesman Ilham Ahmed said: “We are now in the phase of launching a new initiative. We will try by all means to put pressure on this regime to carry out a political settlement so that we preserve the dignity of Syrian citizens.”