Ankara would not tolerate any delay from the US in setting up a safe zone in northern Syria, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Thursday. “They (the US) first need to be sincere and need to understand that Turkey won’t tolerate delaying tactics,” Cavusoglu said during a press conference in Ankara. Ankara announced that many details of the US-Turkish agreement still need to be nailed down, reiterating that the size of the safe zone would be 32-kilometer wide with the withdrawal of Kurdish YPG fighters. The Turkish Foreign Minister’s statements came as a US military delegation, headed by Lieutenant General Stephen Twitty, deputy commander of the US European Command, was expected in the southeastern province of Sanliurfa. The delegation would monitor the establishment of a Joint Operations Center as part of the coordination and management of the planned safe zone in northern Syria. Last week, Turkey and the United States agreed on the establishment of this center, but no agreement has been announced on key details such as the command structure of joint patrols that would be conducted there. Cavusoglu said there would be observation posts and joint patrols. On Wednesday, the Turkish Defense Ministry said that drones have started operating in northern Syria where Washington and Ankara have agreed to create the safe zone. In the battlefield, around 45 regime forces and opposition fighters were killed on Thursday during fierce battles in the countrysides of northern Hama and southern Idlib, said the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights. Over the past week, the Syrian army has advanced toward the town of Khan Sheikhoun, which lies on a key highway coveted by the regime that runs through Idlib, connecting government-held Damascus with the northern city of Aleppo, which was retaken by loyalists from the opposition in December 2016. "The aim of the advance is to surround Khan Sheikhoun and reach the highway," Observatory head Rami Abdul Rahman told Agence France Presse.