Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy is in favor of a trilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkey, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said Tuesday.
“In our meeting with Zelenskyy, he expressed that he is open to a trilateral meeting between Putin, Zelenskyy and Erdoğan,” the president told reporters on the presidential plane on his way back from the United Arab Emirates (UAE).
The president said such a meeting would take place in Istanbul or Ankara, adding that he will discuss the issue with Putin in a phone call to see what he thinks about the proposal.
“We will follow the issue accordingly as a real war breaking out in the region is not a good omen,” Erdoğan said, adding that it would have negative repercussions for the region.
Turkey has been closely following the developments and is in close contact with both Kyiv and Moscow. Ankara has also offered to mediate talks between them.
Putin has accepted Erdoğan’s invitation to visit Turkey amid the tensions and will make the trip once the pandemic and schedules allow, Kremlin said.
Erdoğan also recently visited Kyiv and held talks with Ukrainian President Zelenskyy. The Turkish president reiterated that Turkey stands by its decision not to recognize the annexation of Crimea and declared Ankara's support for Ukraine's Crimean Platform initiative.
Turkey shares the Black Sea with Ukraine and Russia. While forging cooperation on defense and energy, Turkey has opposed Moscow’s policies in Syria and Libya, as well as its annexation of the Crimean Peninsula in 2014. It has also sold sophisticated drones to Ukraine, angering Russia.
The Russian military movements have fueled concerns that Moscow is preparing to send forces into Ukraine. The Kremlin denies its troops are a threat but says they will remain as long as it sees fit.
Turkey has expressed that it is willing to mediate between the two sides if they accept.
Regarding tense relations with Greece, Erdoğan said Turkish officials have made frequent warnings and that Turkey will make the highest-level warning if Greece continues provocations regarding demilitarized islands in the Aegean Sea.
The president also criticized Greece for its indifference to the death of migrants who froze to death on the border with Turkey.
“We always let Europeans know about these and will continue to inform them,” Erdoğan said.
The rearming of the demilitarized Aegean islands has always been a subject of hot debate between the two countries, especially after the 1960s when relations between Ankara and Athens turned sour over the Cyprus question and extended Greek claims over Aegean airspace and territorial waters. Turkey's first reaction to Greece's arming of the islands in the Aegean was a diplomatic note sent to Athens on June 29, 1964.
Greece has often been embroiled in tensions with Turkey over a range of issues, from competing claims over hydrocarbon resources in the Aegean Sea to the demilitarization of islands. Greece's burgeoning arms program is designed to counter Turkish challenges in the Eastern Mediterranean, against which France is among the few European Union states to have offered public support in past months.
Turkey, which has the longest continental coastline in the Eastern Mediterranean, has rejected maritime boundary claims made by EU members Greece and the Greek Cypriot administration, stressing that these excessive claims violate the sovereign rights of both Turkey and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC). Both sides cite a range of treaties and international agreements from over the decades to support their conflicting territorial claims.
Turkish leaders have repeatedly stressed that Ankara favors resolving outstanding problems in the region through international law, good neighborly relations, dialogue and negotiations. Instead of opting to solve problems with Ankara through dialogue, Athens has, on several occasions, refused to sit at the negotiation table and opted to rally Brussels to take a tougher stance against Turkey.
Also touching upon the political crisis in Libya, Erdoğan said that it is out of the question for Turkey to hold back in Libya as it has provided all possible support to the war-torn country from the beginning and will try to give its best during the next process as well.
Underlining that Turkey seeks to help Libya hold an election for a prosperous and peaceful future of the Libyan people, the president said: “We want such an election to be held that with this election, the Libyan people will have the form of government they really want and desire. We are currently in search of this.”
While Erdoğan described the eastern-based parliament’s recent attempt to replace interim Prime Minister Abdul Hamid Dbeibah as “saddening,” he also said that Ankara has good ties with Fathi Bashagha, who was appointed by parliament as the new prime minister, just like it has good ties with Dbeibah.
Erdoğan also criticized the principle of forming temporary governments in Libya and added: “There is a temporary administration logic here. In this temporary administration logic, it is said that a 1 1/2-year government should be established. I do not find such an approach appropriate for Libya. If there is to be made, a decent choice must be made here so that Libya has taken such a long-term step with a strong administrative team at this point.”
The political crisis in Libya has deepened with the Tobruk-based House of Representatives (HoR) parliament in the country's east choosing former Interior Minister Bashagha as prime minister last Thursday, while current Prime Minister Dbeibah has vowed to continue in the post. The failure to hold discussions on the legitimacy of Libya's Government of National Unity (GNU), originally scheduled on Dec. 24, has led to differences of opinion in the west of the country as well.
Khalid al-Mishri, president of the High Council of the State of Libya, said the evaluation meeting, which should be held after the election of the new prime minister, was postponed and they did not take a final position on the issue. Al-Mishri said he would accept the objections in the next session of the council. Evaluations from the Libyan streets indicate that if al-Mishri had also announced support for Bashagha as prime minister, the Dbeibah government would have fallen.
Following the remarks of al-Mishri, Dbeibah, who does not look kindly on the fact that the elections will be held shortly, said he would change his stance and make a statement on Feb. 17 on the elections coinciding with the anniversary of the revolution.
Different scenarios are emerging regarding the situation in the west of the country. The first scenario is that the Dbeibah government will continue to work but Bashagha also establishes a parallel government. The possibility of Dbeibah withdrawing from the race is also being discussed. But this possibility is considered weak. Dbeibah is seen as the prime minister who has served and invested the most in the country in a year since protests started in 2011. He has quite high popular support in the west of the country. The third possibility is that Mohammad Younes Menfi, the chairperson of the Libyan Presidential Council, dissolves the HoR parliament, the Libyan State Supreme Council and the government and declares a state of emergency. Meanwhile, there is also the possibility that a third figure other than Dbeibah and Bashagha may form the government. However, there is no prominent political name acceptable to all parties on the horizon, at least for now.
Turkey and Libya have seen closer ties in recent years, especially after the signing of security and maritime boundary pacts in November 2019, along with Turkey's aid to help the legitimate Libyan government push back putschist Gen. Khalifa Haftar's forces. Libya has been torn by civil war since the ouster of late ruler Moammar Gadhafi in 2011. Turkey has supported the country's United Nations recognized government against the putschist Haftar.
