Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has expressed his support for Ukraine’s NATO membership. “There is no doubt that Ukraine deserves NATO membership,” the Turkish leader said Friday after a meeting with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy in Istanbul.
But Erdogan also said that in the war between Russia and Ukraine, “both sides” should “return to peace talks”. Erdogan also announced that Russian President Vladimir Putin will visit Turkey in August, for the first time since his country’s war of aggression against Ukraine began on February 24, 2022. According to Erdogan, the talks with Putin also include extending the agreement on the export of Ukrainian grain, which expires on July 17.
He also spoke with Selenskyj about the grain deal, Erdogan said. “We hope that the agreement will be renewed at least once every three months and not every two months. We will do our utmost and try to extend the total term to two years,” Erdogan said at a press conference with Zelenskyy about the expiring Black Sea grain agreement.
Erdogan wants to talk to Putin about grain
“I am convinced that all parties involved, aware of the global responsibility, will act accordingly,” Erdogan said on Saturday morning, according to the Ukrainian news agency Ukrinform.
Erdogan also stated that the deal will be one of the main items on the agenda of his meeting with Putin next month. The two statesmen had also discussed the prisoner exchange. Erdogan assured Zelenskyy that he would raise the matter in a telephone conversation with Putin.
The grain agreement, which was concluded in the summer of 2022 by Turkey and the United Nations, expires on July 17. The agreement ended a months-long Russian naval blockade of Ukraine’s Black Sea ports. This allows Ukraine, as one of the world’s leading grain exporters, to export grain again – albeit to a limited extent.
In a written statement on Friday, the UN urged all parties to renew the agreement to ensure global food security. The agreement had been extended several times, most recently for two months in mid-May. However, Russia complains that promises to ease Russian agricultural exports have not been fulfilled in this regard. NATO country Turkey maintains good relations with both Russia and Ukraine.
The Kremlin is curious to see what will be discussed
The Kremlin had previously stated that it was closely monitoring the meeting between Erdogan and Zelensky. Moscow had recently tried to break its growing international isolation by building close ties with Erdogan. “We will monitor the results of these talks very closely,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. “It will be interesting for us to find out what was discussed. It’s important,” he added.
Zelenskyy’s visit to Turkey was his first since the Russian invasion of his country. The Ukrainian president had previously held talks in the Czech Republic and Slovakia.
Source: Krone
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