ANKARA, March 21 (Reuters) - The Turkish lira firmed below 3.60 against the U.S. dollar at 1326 GMT on Tuesday, the strongest level the currency has seen since the end of February.

The lira's recent firming came on the heels of a rate hike by the U.S. Federal Reserve and unorthodox tightening steps by the Turkish Central Bank last week.

Turkey's central bank hiked the cost of funds from its "late liquidity window" by 75 basis points while leaving conventional policy rates on hold last week, ahead of April's landmark political referendum. urn:newsml:reuters.com:*:nL5N1GT3DD

(Reporting by Nevzat Devranoglu; Writing by Tuvan Gumrukcu; Editing by Ece Toksabay) ((tuvan.gumrukcu@tr.com; +903122927021; Reuters Messaging: tuvan.gumrukcu.thomsonreuters.com@reuters.net))

Keywords: TURKEY ECONOMY/LIRA