Turkey has been steadily working day and night to put an end to the war in Ukraine through diplomacy, Presidential Communications Director Fahrettin Altun said Thursday.
Speaking at a conference entitled "The War in Ukraine Regional & Humanitarian Consequences," Altun said Turkey strives to resolve regional crises through diplomatic channels, amid the COVID-19 pandemic, ongoing political and economic tensions and heated clashes.
"We continue to undertake diplomatic initiatives diligently to put an end to the war in Ukraine and will continue to do so," Altun said.
Altun noted that the war in Ukraine, which has become a common concern among many countries throughout the world, has shown that a small problem can turn into a bigger one when not addressed at the right time.
Saying that millions of people lost their homes before the eyes of the world, Altun said Turkey has taken initiatives to stop the war in Ukraine and has become a critical regional actor.
Altun continued by criticizing some countries for failing to recognize Turkey’s efforts and critical role in finding a solution to the Russia-Ukraine war.
"Turkey’s performance as a critical actor in the solution of regional crises was evident, but its performance has not received the praise and support it deserves," Altun said, adding that some countries have recently started realizing Turkey’s stabilizing role in the past few months.
Earlier this month, the U.N. Under-Secretary-General for Political and Peacebuilding Affairs Rosemary DiCarlo praised Turkey's efforts to engage with Russia and Ukraine to help bring about peace and for hosting face-to-face talks with the two countries.
Meanwhile, Altun said Turkey’s mediating efforts are not a coincidence, and are the work of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s leadership.
"As a matter of fact, this is the latest chain of the long-unregarded success of Turkey’s foreign policy led by our president," Altun said, adding that his leadership paved the way for discussions between the two countries in Antalya and Istanbul.
He continued by saying that Turkey believes such crises do not have a military solution and prioritizes ending violence as soon as possible to prevent more civilians from being affected.
"We strongly condemn the targeting of civilians," Altun said.
The communications director continued by saying that sanctions have been inefficient in ending the tragedy on the ground and that diplomacy and negotiations are essential. However, he noted that diplomacy and negotiations require patience.
Altun also criticized the inefficiency of global organizations in solving crises, including the war in Syria, Libya and other parts of the world. He noted that the U.N. Security Council has especially been "paralyzed" by the veto power of permanent members and that Turkey has been calling for a reform to fix this problem.
"The U.N. Security Council, which holds the primary responsibility for solving this crisis, has turned into a theater stage where different actors accuse and threaten each other," Altun said. He also criticized the indifference of the global community for the need to reform the security council until the Ukraine war, as he said Turkey has been trying to bring up the issue for the past decade. Altun continued by saying that almost everyone agrees that these institutions have become the focus of the problem.
Altun suggested that such conflicts can only be solved through a different approach, through strengthening international organizations, and that Turkey will continue to work toward U.N. reform in coordination with all of its institutions.
Humanitarian crises turn into tragedies
Noting that Turkey’s humanitarian approach and its action on humanitarian crises has become one of the highlights of Ankara’s foreign policy, Altun said the country has been warning all countries about humanitarian tragedies.
"While doing so, we do not only focus on the people in our region, but all oppressed people throughout the world," Altun said, adding that Ankara has tried to make the voices of the Rohingya Muslims heard, and is one of the countries leading humanitarian assistance efforts in Africa amid famine.
Turkey has also opposed the anti-migrant, far-right and racist ideology that has been spreading across the world from Europe.
Turkey’s delicately balanced act of assuming a role as a mediator by keeping communication channels with both warring sides open provides a glimmer of hope in diplomatic efforts to find a solution and achieve peace in the Ukraine crisis. With its unique position of having friendly relations with both Russia and Ukraine, Turkey has won widespread praise for its push to end the war.
In a breakthrough, Russian and Ukrainian delegations met for peace talks in Istanbul on March 29 as the war entered its second month with casualties piling up on both sides.
During the talks, Ukrainian officials signaled readiness to negotiate a "neutral status," a key Russian demand, but demanded security guarantees for their country.
Russia, meanwhile, pledged to significantly decrease its military activities toward the Ukrainian cities of Kyiv and Chernihiv to build up trust for future negotiations.
Ukraine wants to see countries, including Turkey, as guarantors in a deal with Russia, a Ukrainian negotiator said after the talks.
Turkey also hosted the foreign ministers of Russia and Ukraine in Antalya last month. Foreign Ministers Sergey Lavrov of Russia and Dmytro Kuleba of Ukraine met for talks in the Turkish resort town of Antalya, which top Turkish diplomat Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu also attended. The talks were largely inconclusive, but Ankara hails it as a success for the fact that they took place at all.