ANKARA [MENL] -- Turkey was set to expand its military dialogue with the United States.

Turkish officials said Ankara and Washington plan to expand their strategic dialogue between their military chiefs. They said the focus of the talks would be the Kurdish insurgency presence in neighboring Iraq .

A U.S. military delegation was scheduled to arrive in Ankara this week to conduct the talks. The delegation would be headed by U.S. Central Command chief Gen. John Abizaid and U.S. European Command chief Gen. James Jones.

Officials said this was the first time that the chiefs of the two U.S. military commands would arrive together in Turkey for strategic talks. Turkey has been located in the area of Eucom operations while Centcom remains responsible for Iraq. The Kurdish Workers Party has been operating in Iran, Iran, Syria and Turkey .