The Organization of Turkic States (OTS), which consists of prominent Turkic nations that work together to elevate their union, doubled its activity to experience one of its busiest years in 2023.
“It was time,” Secretary-General Kubanychbek Omuraliev said of the organization’s year-by-year increasing productivity and momentum in the past three decades it has been active.
“If you look at our history, Turkic states have been together for thousands of years,” Omuraliev told Anadolu Agency (AA).
“We were separated during Soviet communism. After Central Asian countries and Azerbaijan earned their independence 33 years ago, we reunited and our leaders have been together for 14 years.”
The OTS originally emerged as a summit between the heads of Turkic states in 1992 when former Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) countries began declaring independence. It eventually became an international council in 2009, taking on the official name of Turkic Council in 2010 and its current title in 2021, holding nearly two dozen summits so far.
Its members are Türkiye, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, while Hungary, Turkmenistan and the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus have observer status.
The Istanbul-based organization strives to “consolidate the environment of mutual trust in the Turkic world, strengthen political solidarity, accelerate economical and technical cooperation opportunities, ensure that human relations have healthy structures and that historical, cultural accumulations across the region are recorded as expansively as possible.”
The organization has kicked off a comprehensive integration period for its region as part of the Turkic World 2040 Vision Document inked at the 8th Leaders’ Summit in Istanbul in 2021.
Before convening its leaders for the 10th time in the Kazakh capital Astana in November, the OTS organized another summit in March following the Feb. 6 earthquakes that leveled 11 provinces in southern Türkiye.
“While many countries worldwide have stepped up at the time, the support from our nations were different,” Omuraliev said. “Our motto is ‘Stronger together,’ and we have shown to the world (after the quakes) we are indeed stronger together.”
Throughout 2023, the OTS held ten different platform meetings, including on-field cooperation for education, tourism, energy, trade, sports and agriculture. In the first 11 months of the year, a total of 110 events were organized.
In comparison, the organization carried out 43 events in 2021 and 66 in 2022.
Besides agreeing to set up a Union of Supreme Courts this year, members signed the Astana Act and Astana Declaration and over 10 agreements last month in Kazakhstan.
Economy and trade are two of the key fields of cooperation, Omuraliev emphasized, adding that members are currently working on “significant projects for this.”
Members cooperate on energy and transport through the Baku-Tbiliis-Ceyhan oil and Baku-Tbilisi-Erzurum natural gas pipelines.
The Trans-Anatolian pipelines pump Caspian natural gas to Türkiye and Europe.
The goal is to develop a transport network by increasing the role of the East-West-Middle Corridor passing through the Caspian region by including Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Turkmenistan and then expand to Azerbaijan and Türkiye.
In Astana, members congratulated Baku for its victory in Karabakh, which Azerbaijan recaptured from armed illegal separatists in a lightning offensive a month before the summit, reiterating support for the country’s territorial integrity and importance in the Turkic landscape.
OTS also held two meetings on a shared alphabet, one in the Turkish western province of Bursa last year and another in the Kyrgyz capital Bishkek this year, the secretary general said, teasing “certain innovations in the coming term.”
Omuraliev himself has been touring cities like Brussels, Geneva, Vienna, New York and Paris, visiting and holding talks with the headquarters of international organizations on behalf of OTS.
“There are many international organizations around the world, but OTS is different because our religion, language, history and culture are the same,” he said, adding: “Our peoples have been brothers for over a thousand years, which is very important for our leaders to work together. Our people cannot be separated. That’s the most important thing.”
In 2024, Uzbekistan will be handing over its presidential term to Kazakhstan, which will host the 11th Leaders’ Summit in Bishkek in November.
“The New Year will witness many events as per the ‘Turk Time’ motto,” Omuraliev assured.
