Türkiye’s diplomatic efforts for global peace continued uninterruptedly in 2024 under the leadership of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Throughout the year, Erdoğan visited 17 countries and attended international summits.
Erdoğan launched a diplomatic blitz for solutions to regional and global issues, particularly the ongoing attacks of Israel targeting Palestinians. Along with visits abroad, he hosted heads of state and government from 18 countries.
The president made his first visit of the year to Dubai on Feb. 13, where he attended as a guest of honor at the World Governments Summit, which took place with the theme of “Shaping Governments of the Future.” One day later, he visited Egypt, where he met President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi in Cairo. It was the first visit by the Turkish leader to Egypt under the leadership of el-Sissi and the first in 11 years. Türkiye downgraded diplomatic relations with Egypt after el-Sissi took over in 2013, although commercial ties have mainly remained unharmed. Erdoğan’s visit crowned the normalization process that began in 2022 when the two leaders briefly met on the sidelines of the World Cup in Qatar and continued with the appointment of ambassadors in 2023. The process accelerated after Israel began its vicious attacks in Palestine, pushing the two countries to find a common ground to counter this threat and pursue a solution to the conflict while coordinating humanitarian aid delivery through Egypt’s Rafah crossing with the Palestinian enclave. The February 2023, earthquakes in Türkiye’s south that claimed thousands of lives paved the way for further normalization as Egypt sent aid and its foreign minister to Türkiye, offering assistance in the aftermath of the disaster. The president received a warm welcome in Egypt with el-Sissi scrapping diplomatic protocols and hugging Erdoğan as soon as he disembarked his plane. This was the first sign of a new era between two countries that shared an intertwined history for centuries.
On April 22, Erdoğan made another landmark visit, this time to Iraq, where he met the president and prime minister and held talks with representatives of Sunni communities and the Iraqi Turkmen community. This was Erdoğan’s first visit to Türkiye’s southeastern neighbor in years and primarily aimed at cooperation for counterterrorism, namely against the terrorist group PKK, which maintains hideouts in Iraq’s north. Erdoğan also met leaders of Iraq’s Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG), which controls that part of Iraq, during his visit. The visit is viewed as a turning point in counterterrorism efforts as the two countries affirmed PKK’s threat to their security.
On June 12, Erdoğan visited Spain, where they signed deals with Spanish leaders and attended an intergovernmental summit. Two days later, he traveled to Italy to attend a G-7 summit where he also held talks with U.S. President Joe Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron. Erdoğan’s subsequent discussions included meetings with Pope Francis, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Algerian President Abdulmajed Tebboun, Jordan’s King Abdullah II, European Council chief Charles Michel, UAE leader Muhammad bin Zayed al-Nahyan, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, OECD Secretary-General Mathias Cormann and U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres.
One month later, Erdoğan traveled to Kazakhstan’s Astana to attend a leaders summit of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, where he held talks with leaders of Russia, China, Azerbaijan, Pakistan, Mongolia, Belarus and Qatar. He said at the summit that Türkiye was ready to engage in more dialogue with the SCO while pointing out that the current system lost its legitimacy after inaction over the killing of thousands of children in Gaza by Israel. The nine-member SCO, which encompasses a vast area from Moscow to Beijing, includes around half the world's population. Türkiye is not a full member of the SCO but has been a dialogue partner of the organization since 2012.
On July 6, Erdoğan traveled to Berlin to watch the Euro 2024 quarterfinals between Türkiye and the Netherlands.
Three days later, he traveled to the United States to attend a NATO summit that brought together heads of state and governments from the alliance. Erdoğan met leaders of France, Ukraine, the United Kingdom and Germany at the summit.
On July 20, Erdoğan attended events in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) to mark the anniversary of Türkiye’s Peace Operation that helped Turkish Cypriots stave off Greek Cypriot attacks. In an address to the ceremonies in the TRNC, Erdoğan highlighted that a "federal" solution was not possible for the Cyprus issue. The Greek Cypriot community and their sponsors in Europe advocate reunification of the island, while the TRNC and Türkiye reject any solution for the split in the island that will degrade the status of Turkish Cypriots. The TRNC is only recognized by Türkiye and suffers from longstanding embargoes due to its persistence to exist as an independent state.
Erdoğan’s next destination was the United Nations. He traveled to New York in September to attend the 79th General Assembly. On the sidelines of the event, he met several counterparts, from Serbian and Iranian presidents to the Ukrainian president, along with prime ministers and monarchs, as well as the U.N.’s Guterres and International Criminal Court’s Karim Khan.
He criticized the United Nations' inaction and Western countries' complicity in Israel's massacres in Gaza as he addressed the General Assembly debate in a passionate speech questioning the dysfunctionality of the global body. Erdoğan said the U.N. falls short of fulfilling its foundational mission. In recent years, it has become a dysfunctional, idle structure without the ability to implement resolutions passed by a vast majority of its member-states.
He noted that Gaza has become the world's largest graveyard for children and women as a result of Israel's attacks. "Children are not the only ones being killed, but moral values allegedly defended by the West are also dying in Gaza," he said. Erdoğan continued by calling on human rights organizations, "Aren't those in Gaza and West Bank human beings?"
Saying that the U.N. was originally established to maintain international peace and security after World War II, but in recent years, the global body has "been struggling to fulfill its founding mission and is gradually turning into a dysfunctional, unwieldy and inert structure." Highlighting the serious damage caused by Israeli attacks in Gaza, Erdoğan said the blockaded Palestinian enclave has become the largest cemetery for women and children in the world, where over 17,000 children were targeted by Israeli bullets and bombs. Erdoğan's passionate speech was frequently interrupted by rounds of applause as he questioned the West's morality.
"Are the ones in Gaza, the ones in the West Bank, not human beings? The children in Palestine, do they not have the right to study, live and play in the streets?" Erdoğan asked human rights organizations and continued, "The journalists that Israel massacred on live TV, whose offices were raided, are they not your colleagues?" Erdoğan told Western media outlets, which are criticized for remaining silent and their biased reporting of Israel's atrocities. "For how long will you continue to bear the shame of looking at this massacre, of being its accomplices?" the president asked countries unconditionally supporting Israel. The president reiterated Türkiye's call for all countries to recognize a Palestinian state and stand on the "right side of history." "I also invite other states that have not yet done so to recognize the State of Palestine as soon as possible and take their place on the right side of history at this very critical period," Erdoğan said. Erdoğan said while an urgent cease-fire is necessary in Gaza, the main issue is the occupation of Palestinian territories by Israel. “It is important that an independent, sovereign, and geographically contiguous Palestinian state on the basis of the 1967 borders, with East Jerusalem as its capital, is created,” he said.
Repeating his criticism of Western complicity, Erdoğan said the global community has displayed a poor account of itself. He continued by saying that what is happening in Palestine is an indicator of a huge moral breakdown, as he called on world leaders to reflect on “this painful picture.”
On Oct. 10, Erdoğan visited Albania, where he attended ceremonies to sign cooperation deals and inaugurated the Balkans’ largest mosque financed by Türkiye in Tirana. He later visited Serbia, where he attended a high-level cooperation council meeting with his Serbian counterpart, Alexander Vucic.
Another important summit for Erdoğan was BRICS. He attended the event held in Russia's Tatarstan on Oct. 23, one month before his attendance at the Organization of Turkic States (OTS) meeting in Kyrgyzstan. BRICS offered Türkiye partner country status, Ankara later announced. Ankara sees the BRICS group as an opportunity to further economic cooperation with member states rather than an alternative to its Western ties and NATO membership, Erdoğan has said earlier. Turkish officials have repeatedly said that the potential membership of BRICS would not affect Türkiye's responsibilities to the Western military alliance.
In November, Erdoğan traveled to Hungary to attend the fifth summit of the European Political Community and met EU states’ leaders. The same month, he attended an extraordinary summit of the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) and Arab League in Saudi Arabia, before traveling to Azerbaijan to attend the COP29 conference on climate change.
Also in November, Erdoğan flew to Brazil’s Rio de Janeiro for the G-20 leaders’ summit. There, he repeated his call for an immediate and permanent cease-fire amid the ongoing humanitarian catastrophe in Gaza.
The president’s last visit abroad was to Egypt on Dec. 19, where he attended the D-8 Summit. Again, he warned against Israeli aggression in the Middle East, as he called on all countries to take concrete action and isolate it on a global scale. Erdoğan said in a speech at the summit that imposing an arms embargo and ending trade with Israel, isolating it internationally, is crucial to hold Israel accountable for its violations in the region. "We see Israel's steps that disregard Syria's territorial integrity, including the expansion of illegal settlements in the Golan Heights," he said.
He also called for a more coordinated response from Islamic countries, especially members of the D-8. "As Islamic countries, we must lead steps that can be taken against Israel," Erdoğan said. The president emphasized that such a united stance is vital for regional stability and for the pursuit of a just, lasting peace in the Middle East. "I believe the D-8 must respond more strongly to the lawlessness threatening Syria's stability and our region," he added.
Apart from visits abroad, Erdoğan hosted a large number of heads of state and government from around the world. His first guest was the late Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi on Jan. 24. In February, he hosted Azerbaijan’s Ilham Aliyev. Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas met Erdoğan in Ankara on March 5, three days before a visit by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy.
Erdoğan’s other guests in 2024 included the presidents of Tanzania, Germany, Uzbekistan, Estonia, Egypt, Finland, Senegal and Montenegro, along with the Kuwaiti emir, Qatari emir and Oman’s sultan.
When he was unable to visit abroad or host guests due to a tight schedule in Türkiye, Erdoğan held phone calls with world leaders, from the presidents of the U.S., Russia, Iran and Azerbaijan to Pope Francis. Putin was the recipient of most phone calls. Erdoğan and Putin held seven phone calls in 2024, discussing developments regarding the Russian-Ukrainian conflict, the conflict in Syria and the Palestine-Israel conflict.
