NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg said on Monday that Turkey has not asked the Alliance for “substantial military support” in its fight against the Islamic State group and Kurdish militants.

"Turkey has a very strong army and very strong security forces. So there has been no request for any substantial NATO military support," AFP quoted Stoltenberg as saying in an interview with the BBC.

Stoltenberg spoke a day before the Alliance convenes at Turkey’s request to discuss military operations against the IS and Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) militants who have waged a guerrilla war in southeast Turkey since 1984.

Stoltenberg, however, said in an interview with Norwegian television on Sunday that Turkey’s bombing campaign targeting Kurdish positions in northern Iraq could jeopardize the progress toward reaching a peace deal with Kurdish militants achieved in recent years.

Turkey regards the PKK as a terrorist organisation and the main Syrian Kurdish group fighting IS -- the Democratic Union Party (PYD) -- as the PKK's Syrian branch.

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