Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday he did not rule out a possible meeting with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to help restore bilateral relations between the neighbors.
Türkiye severed ties with Syria after the 2011 Syrian civil war and supported opposition looking to oust Assad.
It has carried out several cross-border military operations against militants it says threaten its national security and formed a "safe zone" in northern Syria where Turkish troops are now stationed.
Asked by reporters about Assad's reported comments that his government was open to normalization initiatives as long as they respected Syria's sovereignty and contributed to counter-terrorism, Erdogan said Ankara and Damascus could act to restore ties.
"There is no reason for it not to happen," Erdogan said, and added Türkiye had no intention of interfering in Syria's internal affairs.
"Just as we kept our ties very lively in the past - we even held talks between our families with Mr Assad - it is certainly not possible (to say) this will not happen again in the future, it can happen," he said after Friday prayers.
Syrian officials have repeatedly said that any moves towards normalizing ties between Damascus and Ankara can only come after Türkiye agrees to pull out thousands of troops it has stationed in the opposition-held northwest.
In April 2023, the defense ministers and intelligence chiefs of Iran, Russia, Syria and Türkiye held talks, as part of efforts to rebuild Türkiye-Syria ties after years of animosity.
