Syrian Kurdish forces have recaptured more than a third of the villages around Kobane from the Islamic State group since routing the jihadists from the town a fortnight ago, a monitor said Sunday.

"The (Kurdish) People's Protection Units (YPG) have recaptured 128 villages out of some 350 in the past two weeks," said Syrian Observatory for Human Rights director Rami Abdel Rahman.

Turkish police on Sunday launched a new wave of raids seeking to arrest suspects accused of wiretapping the communications of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and other top officials.

Istanbul prosecutors issued warrants for 21 police officers, the official Anatolia news agency said. 

The powerful head of Turkey's intelligence agency, one of the most loyal allies of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, has resigned to stand for election as a lawmaker, the official Anatolia news agency said Saturday.

The resignation of Hakan Fidan, who has headed the National Intelligence Agency (MIT) since 2010, has been accepted by Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu and will take effect on Tuesday, it added.

Turkish police on Friday arrested 60 people after boarding two buses of demonstrators planning to protest outside President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's presidential palace in Ankara over the fatal wounding of a protester in 2013 rallies against his rule.

Police used pepper sprays inside the bus and roughly arrested the demonstrators, who were members of the Popular Front leftist group, an AFP photographer reported.

Turkey's Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu on Friday said he had canceled a plan to attend the Munich security conference in protest at the inclusion of Israeli representatives in a session on the Middle East.

"I was going to participate in the conference but we decided not to after they included the Israeli representatives in the Middle East session," he told the official Anatolia news agency in Berlin.

The ousted chief executive of a Turkish bank linked to the top foe of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday said the deposed leadership was appealing the "illegal" decision in court.

Turkey's state-run Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF) late Tuesday seized control of Bank Asya, which is linked to Erdogan's former ally turned enemy, the U.S.-based preacher Fethullah Gulen.

Turkey on Thursday made a new call for Washington to extradite the U.S.-based Turkish preacher Fethullah Gulen, as Ankara steps up its campaign against the number one enemy of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. 

Erdogan accuses Gulen and his supporters of using influence within the judiciary, police and state bureaucracy to plot against the government. 

Authorities in Turkey arrested a man suspected of working for the Islamic State (IS), in what local media said was the first arrest of a Turkish citizen linked to the jihadist group. 

The man, identified as Musa Goktas from Ankara, illegally crossed into Syria in October with his 15-year-old twin sons to join the jihadist group, the online newspaper Radikal said Wednesday.  

The Turkish parliament on Wednesday postponed until next week a debate on a controversial security bill bolstering police powers that critics claim could harshly restrict freedom in the country.

The so-called "homeland security reform" bill was submitted to parliament by the ruling Islamic-rooted Justice and Development Party (AKP) following deadly pro-Kurdish protests in October.

The Islamic State group's gruesome murder of a captured Jordanian pilot is the consequence of Amman's support for Syrian rebels, Syrian media said on Wednesday.

The commentary in newspapers close to the government echoed longstanding claims by President Bashar al-Assad's regime that Jordan is backing "terrorists" by supporting rebels.