Turkey is demanding further assurances from the US before allowing either a deployment of troops or over-flying of its airspace by US aircraft, according to a report in the Washington Post on 13 March. Turkish officials are said to believe that their approval is sufficiently important to US war plans that Washington will delay an invasion of Iraq until it is granted. US officials say that this is a miscalculation and that the war can go ahead without Turkish help. Ankara is holding out for guarantees on the rights of the Turkomen minority in Iraq and on a Turkish voice in the shaping of post-war Iraq. In a recent interview on Turkish television, US State Department under-secretary for political affairs, Marc Grossman, said that the latter was what Turkey risked losing by not co-operating (MEED 5:3:03). 'I think that Turkey loses a chance to be involved [in the shaping of a new Iraq] in a more significant way,' he said.