Kurdish People's Protection Units (YPG) fighters take up positions inside a damaged building in al-Vilat al-Homor neighborhood in Hasaka city in July 2015. Photo: Reuters

Washington: United States special operations forces were not authorised to wear the patches of Kurdish militants while advising them in Syria and have been told to remove them, a US military spokesman in Baghdad says after Turkish leaders protested.

Army Colonel Steve Warren said that while US special operations forces have historically and routinely worn the insignia of foreign troops they are working with, this case was not appropriate due largely to political sensitivities.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said it was unacceptable for soldiers of a Turkish ally to use the patches of the YPG, the Kurdish People's Protection Units fighting against the Islamic State group.

Turkey views the YPG as an extension of the Kurdish Workers' Party, or PKK, an armed insurgent group which is considered a terrorist organisation by Turkey, the US, the European Union and Australia.

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Photos of US special operations forces wearing the insignia surfaced this week, and Turkish leaders relayed their complaint to the US.

"There's political sensitivities around the organisation that that patch represents, and that makes it inappropriate," Warren told Pentagon reporters on Friday.

"These guys on the ground do what they're going to do and they have their customs and courtesies that they have been following for years. But it's also important to understand the larger strategic context ... and I think that's the inappropriateness of it, is that they didn't understand that."

Warren said the troops were told the remove the patches and that he was not aware of any discipline related to the incident.

"We've made the correction, so everybody's moving on," said Warren.

Cavusoglu said Turkey had relayed its displeasure to US officials, and rejected explanations that the patches were for the soldiers' protection.

"In that case, we would recommend they use the patches of Daesh, al-Nusra and al-Qaeda when they go to other parts of Syria and of Boko Haram when they go to Africa," he said in reference to extremist militant groups.

"To those who say they don't consider the YPG to be the same as these terrorist groups, this is our response: this is applying double standards, this is being two-faced," Cavusoglu added.

AAP