Turkish and Russian leaders hold talks as Moscow continues to attack Ukrainian grain-exporting ports
The Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has concluded face-to-face talks with Vladimir Putin by claiming a deal to export Ukrainian grain through the Black Sea could be revived.
But there was no evidence of a breakthrough as the Russian leader again accused the west of reneging on promises.
Continue reading...Stockholm apologetic amid fears Turkey may delay lifting Nato veto following desecration of holy book
Thousands of people took part in protests across Muslim majority nations on Friday after a second incident in Sweden involving the desecration of the Qur’an.
The episode left the Swedish government apologetic and fearing that the outrage in the Middle East may delay Turkey lifting its veto on Sweden’s membership of Nato.
Continue reading...Recep Tayyip Erdoğan agreed to set aside his veto following last-ditch talks on the eve of the Nato summit in Vilnius, Lithuania
Sweden is to be allowed to join Nato after Turkey’s president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, agreed to set aside his veto and recommend to his parliament that Sweden’s application go ahead.
The Monday night breakthrough came in last-ditch talks on the eve of the Nato summit in Vilnius, Lithuania.
Continue reading...Erdoğan throws another obstacle in way of agreement by insisting Turkish EU membership be back on table
Joe Biden will try to nail down a four-country deal that would lead to Turkey allowing Sweden into Nato in return for the sale of US F-16 jets to Ankara, on the condition they are not used to threaten Greece.
But Recep Tayyip Erdoğan threw a surprise obstacle in the way of Biden’s plan by announcing he wanted Turkey’s stalled application to join the EU to be included in the package. Speaking at the airport before departing for the Nato summit in Vilnius, Lithuania, the Turkish president said: “First, let’s pave the way for Turkey in the European Union, and then we will pave the way for Sweden just as we did for Finland.”
Continue reading...Re-elected president could take Nato country further towards Russia, or may instead be more open to alternatives
Western capitals remained silent through Turkey’s presidential campaign – privately hoping Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s erratic 20-year rule would come to a surprise close – but now he has been handed a decisive mandate to serve a third term, the west is caught between fear and hope.
It fears he will exploit the result to take this Nato founder member further from the liberal secular west, but hopes against hope that, not being eligible to run again and thus freed from the need to pander to a nationalist electorate for the rest of his political life, he may at least be open to persuasion and base his foreign policy on something other than self-preservation.
Continue reading...Swedish prime minister also said he hopes Sweden’s accession will be ratified by Ankara after May elections
Finland’s president, Sauli Niinistö, has said he expects his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, to tell him whether Turkey is endorsing the Nordic country’s Nato membership application when the two meet in Ankara later this week.
“It was known that once President Erdoğan has made his decision concerning ratification of Finland’s membership of Nato, he would wish to meet and fulfil his promise directly from president to president,” Niinistö told Reuters on Wednesday.
Continue reading...The survivors, including two teenagers, saved as rescue teams look to next phase of aid
Seven more people have been rescued eight days after a massive earthquake hit Turkey and Syria, but hopes of finding further survivors of what the World Health Organization called the worst natural disaster in 100 years in its 53-country Europe region are dwindling.
As a UN aid convoy entered stricken north-west Syria through a new crossing, the combined death toll rose to nearly 38,000, including 31,974 in Turkey and at least 5,714 in rebel-held and government-controlled Syria – a figure that is expected to continue to increase.
Continue reading...Warnings current toll of 33,000 from earthquake that struck parts of Turkey and Syria could double
Turkish authorities have issued more than 100 arrest warrants over collapsed buildings, amid warnings that the death toll from the earthquake that struck parts of Turkey and Syria could double from the current tally of 33,000.
State media reported that at least 12 people were in custody, including contractors, architects and engineers connected to some of the tens of thousands of buildings destroyed or seriously damaged in Monday’s 7.8- and 7.6-magnitude quakes.
Continue reading...Hundreds of thousands more people have been left homeless in often sub-zero winter conditions
A second convoy of aid trucks has crossed into stricken north-western Syria from Turkey, as rescuers continued to pull survivors – including a newborn baby – from the rubble 100 hours after an earthquake that has killed more than 23,000 people.
Hundreds of thousands more people have been left homeless and short of food in often sub-zero winter conditions after 7.8- and 7.6-magnitude quakes struck within hours of each other on Monday. Dozens of countries have pledged help and sent emergency teams.
Continue reading...Turkish president rejects growing criticism as rescuers continue to pull survivors from freezing rubble
Turkey’s president has rejected growing criticism of the authorities’ response to Monday’s huge earthquakes, as the death toll passed 15,000 across Turkey and Syria and rescuers continued to pull survivors from the freezing rubble.
Making his first visit to Turkey’s worst-affected region since the 7.8- and 7.5-magnitude quakes hit within hours of each other, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan acknowledged early problems with Turkey’s response but said it was now working well.
Continue reading...Turkish president will travel to epicentre amid mounting criticism of authorities’ response
The official death toll from the devastating earthquake that struck Turkey and neighbouring Syria has risen to more than 9,500, with the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, announcing plans to travel to the epicentre.
Amid mounting criticism of the authorities’ response to Monday’s 7.8-magnitude quake and calls for the government to send more help to the disaster zone, Erdoğan was due to travel to town of Pazarcık and the worst-hit province of Hatay.
Continue reading...7.8-magnitude tremor hit early on Monday, with second major quake mid-morning hampering rescue efforts
More than 2,000 people were killed when an earthquake struck central Turkey and north-west Syria, in one of the most powerful quakes in the region in at least a century, while a second powerful tremor hours later threatened to overwhelm rescue efforts.
Thousands more were injured as the quake wiped out entire sections of major cities in a region filled with millions of people who have fled the civil war in Syria.
Continue reading...Turkish president’s comments come amid tensions with Stockholm and threaten to derail the alliance’s hopes of expanding to 32 countries
Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said for the first time that Ankara could accept Finland into Nato without its Nordic neighbour Sweden.
Erdoğan’s comments during a televised meeting with younger voters came days after Ankara suspended Nato accession talks with the two countries.
Continue reading...Swedish government distances itself from hanging of presidential dummy in Stockholm stunt by Kurdish group
Turkey has summoned the Swedish ambassador after a Kurdish group hung an effigy of the Turkish president in Stockholm, in a stunt that has inflamed tensions between the two countries over Sweden’s bid to join Nato.
Sweden’s foreign minister, Tobias Billström, said his government strongly distanced itself from “threats and hatred against political representatives”. Without naming any specific country, he added: “Portraying a popularly elected president as being executed outside City Hall is abhorrent.”
Continue reading...Six people died and 81 were injured when Istanbul’s popular pedestrian thoroughfare İstiklal Avenue was hit by a bomb attack
Turkey’s interior minister has accused Kurdish militants in northern Syria of responsibility for a bombing in a busy Istanbul shopping thoroughfare that killed six people, and said that a suspect had been arrested.
Six people died and 81 were injured when a bomb struck Istanbul’s popular pedestrian thoroughfare İstiklal Avenue, timed to strike when it was most crowded. Turkey’s justice minister, Bekir Bozdağ, said that “a woman sat on a bench there for 45 minutes”, and that the explosion occurred moments after she left.
Continue reading...Russian leader has backed down in face of defiance, and move also shows Turkey’s growing influence
In the end, Vladimir Putin backed down. Faced with blocking ships carrying grain from Ukraine or tacitly admitting that his threats to do so had been a bluff, the Kremlin leader opted not to rekindle a global food crisis.
Russia’s exit from the deal that allowed exports of grain from Ukraine through the Black Sea was weeks in the making. Russia had threatened to do so after an explosion rocked the Crimea Bridge in October, and again after the drone attack on its Black Sea fleet last week.
Continue reading...Erdoğan demands action against ‘terrorist’ Kurdish militants as Nordic pair maintain united front
The prime ministers of Finland and Sweden have urged Hungary and Turkey to approve their countries’ applications to join Nato, but Ankara insisted it would not lift its objections without further extraditions of suspects it considers terrorists.
The two Nordic nations applied to join the US-led defence alliance in May, jettisoning decades of military non-alignment in a historic policy shift triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Continue reading...UNHCR says circumstances of ‘shocking’ discovery unclear amid rising tension between two countries
The UN refugee agency is demanding an urgent investigation into the discovery of 92 naked people on Greece’s land border with Turkey, calling the incident shocking and saying it had been “deeply distressed” by images of the group.
The men, mainly from Afghanistan and Syria, were found close to the frontier after crossing the Evros River in rubber dinghies, according to Greek police. Children were among the group, a UNHCR spokesperson told the Guardian.
Continue reading...UN secretary general calls for urgent withdrawal of Russian forces and equipment from Zaporizhzhia
Ukraine’s military intelligence has warned that Russian forces may be preparing to stage a “provocation” at a nuclear power plant they control, as the UN secretary general, António Guterres, called for an urgent withdrawal of military forces and equipment from the site.
Guterres, on his second visit to Ukraine since the Russian invasion, joined the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy, and the Turkish president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, for meetings and then a press conference in the western city of Lviv.
Continue reading...Talks expected to focus on Ukraine and could include Kremlin efforts to circumvent western sanctions
Vladimir Putin has met Recep Tayyip Erdoğan for talks expected to focus on Russia’s war in Ukraine and that are being rumoured to include Kremlin efforts to circumvent western sanctions.
Putin welcomed the Turkish president to Sochi, a resort city on the Black Sea, by thanking him for his help in securing an international deal that resumed exports of grain from Ukraine that had been disrupted by the Kremlin war machine – as well as Russian foodstuffs and fertilisers – to world markets.
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