The United States needs to withdraw from northern Syria's Manbij region immediately, Turkish foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Saturday.
He also said Turkey wanted to see concrete steps by the US to end its support for the Syrian Kurdish militia that Ankara is fighting in northern Syria.
Earlier, Ankara said the US had reiterated a pledge to stop arming the People's Protection Units (YPG).
Saturday marked the eight day of a Turkish offensive against the YPG in the town of Afrin.
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Friday that his country's forces would sweep Kurdish fighters from the Syrian border and could push all the way east to the frontier with Iraq, including Manbij. But such a move would risk confrontation with US forces based in Kurdish-held territory.
The Turkish presidency said on Saturday that US national security adviser HR McMaster "confirmed" to Mr Erdogan's spokesman, Ibrahim Kalin, in a phone call late on Friday that Washington would "not give weapons to the YPG".
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It came after Turkish officials said in November last year that US president Donald Trump had told them Washington would no longer supply weapons to the YPG.
Ankara launched its operation against the YPG, dubbed "Olive Branch", on Saturday last week, with Turkish ground troops and air strikes supported by Syrian Arab opposition fighters.
Health workers say they fear the offensive will lead to a humanitarian "tragedy" as medicines run short and the number of civilian casualties keeps rising.
"Medication and humanitarian aid necessary to help civilians will soon run out," said Khalil Sabri Ahmed, head of the main hospital in Afrin which had received dozens of civilian casualties in the past week.
Meanwhile, relations between Nato allies Ankara and Washington have been further strained by the offensive, with the US urging restraint and fearing an impact on the fight against ISIL.
One of the issues marring relations between the two countries was the US supplying the YPG — which has spearheaded the anti-extremist fight — with arms since last year in battles against ISIL.
During Friday's call, Mr McMaster and Mr Kalin cited Turkey's "legitimate security concerns" and agreed to co-ordinate closely in order to prevent misunderstandings, the presidency said.
Just days earlier, Washington and Ankara had bitterly contested each other's accounts of a telephone conversation between Mr Erdogan and Mr Trump.
A White House statement said Mr Trump had urged Turkey to "limit its military actions", but a Turkish official said this was not an accurate reflection of the leaders' call.
Ankara accuses the YPG of being a "terrorist" offshoot of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), which has waged a three-decade insurgency against the Turkish state.
But the Syrian Kurdish militia has been working closely with Washington against ISIL in Syria.
With the support of the US-led coalition's air power and special forces, the YPG-dominated Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) alliance led the battle last year against ISIL during which the extremists lost their de facto capital of Raqqa.
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Mercer, the investment consulting arm of US services company Marsh & McLennan, expects its wealth division to at least double its assets under management (AUM) in the Middle East as wealth in the region continues to grow despite economic headwinds, a company official said.
Mercer Wealth, which globally has $160 billion in AUM, plans to boost its AUM in the region to $2-$3bn in the next 2-3 years from the present $1bn, said Yasir AbuShaban, a Dubai-based principal with Mercer Wealth.
“Within the next two to three years, we are looking at reaching $2 to $3 billion as a conservative estimate and we do see an opportunity to do so,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Mercer does not directly make investments, but allocates clients’ money they have discretion to, to professional asset managers. They also provide advice to clients.
“We have buying power. We can negotiate on their (client’s) behalf with asset managers to provide them lower fees than they otherwise would have to get on their own,” he added.
Mercer Wealth’s clients include sovereign wealth funds, family offices, and insurance companies among others.
From its office in Dubai, Mercer also looks after Africa, India and Turkey, where they also see opportunity for growth.
Wealth creation in Middle East and Africa (MEA) grew 8.5 per cent to $8.1 trillion last year from $7.5tn in 2015, higher than last year’s global average of 6 per cent and the second-highest growth in a region after Asia-Pacific which grew 9.9 per cent, according to consultancy Boston Consulting Group (BCG). In the region, where wealth grew just 1.9 per cent in 2015 compared with 2014, a pickup in oil prices has helped in wealth generation.
BCG is forecasting MEA wealth will rise to $12tn by 2021, growing at an annual average of 8 per cent.
Drivers of wealth generation in the region will be split evenly between new wealth creation and growth of performance of existing assets, according to BCG.
Another general trend in the region is clients’ looking for a comprehensive approach to investing, according to Mr AbuShaban.
“Institutional investors or some of the families are seeing a slowdown in the available capital they have to invest and in that sense they are looking at optimizing the way they manage their portfolios and making sure they are not investing haphazardly and different parts of their investment are working together,” said Mr AbuShaban.
Some clients also have a higher appetite for risk, given the low interest-rate environment that does not provide enough yield for some institutional investors. These clients are keen to invest in illiquid assets, such as private equity and infrastructure.
“What we have seen is a desire for higher returns in what has been a low-return environment specifically in various fixed income or bonds,” he said.
“In this environment, we have seen a de facto increase in the risk that clients are taking in things like illiquid investments, private equity investments, infrastructure and private debt, those kind of investments were higher illiquidity results in incrementally higher returns.”
The Abu Dhabi Investment Authority, one of the largest sovereign wealth funds, said in its 2016 report that has gradually increased its exposure in direct private equity and private credit transactions, mainly in Asian markets and especially in China and India. The authority’s private equity department focused on structured equities owing to “their defensive characteristics.”
