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ANKARA: Turkey And Russia Move Closer To Building Strategic Partners

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  • ANKARA: Turkey And Russia Move Closer To Building Strategic Partners

    TURKEY AND RUSSIA MOVE CLOSER TO BUILDING STRATEGIC PARTNERSHIP

    Today's Zaman, Turkey
    Jan 15 2010

    Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart,
    Vladimir Putin, attend a joint press conference on Wednesday.

    Turkey and Russia have come closer to building a strategic partnership
    by agreeing to deepen cooperation in the area of energy and work on
    a plan to lift visa requirements for their citizens.

    The two countries also have ambitious plans to boost their trade volume
    to $100 billion in the coming years. "Our relations are developing
    and becoming more diversified in the political, military, economic
    and cultural spheres. What is exciting for me is that both sides have
    a positive will," to further boost ties, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip
    Erdogan said at a joint press conference with his Russian counterpart,
    Vladimir Putin, late on Wednesday.

    Erdogan, who had talks with Putin and Russian President Dmitry Medvedev
    during his one-day visit to Moscow, announced that the two countries
    will start work on abolishing visa requirements for their nationals.

    "The prime minister [Putin] has just given us the good news that
    efforts to mutually abolish the visa requirements will go forward
    as planned," Erdogan said, adding that the Turkish side hoped that
    a final deal would be concluded during an upcoming visit by Medvedev
    in May or June.

    Erdogan said later in Ä°stanbul that the two countries would also
    hold a strategic cooperation council meeting during Medvedev's visit,
    a cooperation platform similar to the ones Turkey launched with
    neighboring Syria and Iraq last year.

    Both Putin and Erdogan pledged to increase the use of national
    currencies in bilateral trade, which the leaders want to boost to
    $100 billion within the next five years. Erdogan said the aim is
    achievable in the next four years.

    In another key achievement of Erdogan's short visit, Energy Minister
    Taner Yıldız and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin signed
    a memorandum on building nuclear power plants in Turkey in a sign
    that Russian firms would be given a second chance to build Ankara's
    first plant.

    Turkey canceled a previous tender to build a nuclear power station,
    after a court earlier ruled the tender, won by Russian Inter RAO and
    Atomstroiexport and Turkey's Park Teknik, invalid due to problems
    with the pricing of electricity from the plant.

    Putin and Erdogan also had talks on energy projects. Putin said the
    governments of Italy, Turkey and Russia should consider signing a
    deal to support the proposed Samsun-Ceyhan pipeline, an oil link
    between Turkey's Black Sea coast and the Mediterranean.

    The Russian prime minister also said Russia has won Turkish support for
    all its major oil, gas and nuclear projects, while carefully avoiding
    its usual harsh criticism of the rival trans-Turkish EU-backed Nabucco
    gas pipeline. He said Ankara had pledged to fully clear the Russian gas
    pipeline project South Stream before November 2010, when construction
    is due to begin.

    "We have an agreement that before Nov. 10, 2010 ... the Turkish
    government will make all the necessary judgments and issue a
    construction permit. In the course of today's talks Mr. Erdogan
    confirmed these intentions," Putin said. "I very much hope this work
    will be finished as planned," he said, adding that the work on South
    Stream was going according to plan with environmental, geological
    and seismic studies near completion.

    Putin also said the project, which apart from Russia's gas
    export monopoly Gazprom involves Italy's ENI, may benefit from an
    inter-governmental agreement between Russia, Turkey and Italy.

    Turkey aspires to become a key transit hub for Europe, but is facing
    a tough balancing game between rival projects supported by Moscow and
    the European Union. It insists South Stream and Nabucco are not rivals.

    Putin added that cooperation with Turkey should also involve asset
    swaps between major firms and added Russian firms were ready to take
    part in the privatization of Turkey's state assets.

    Russia: No link between Armenia ties, Karabakh Putin also told Erdogan
    that Turkey should not link the problem of Nagorno-Karabakh, a region
    of Azerbaijan populated by ethnic Armenians who are now in control
    of the area, to its bilateral relations with Armenia. "Both the
    Nagorno-Karabakh problem and the Turkish-Armenian problem are very
    complicated by nature. I do not think it is right to tie them into
    one package," Putin said. "It is unwise from both a tactical and a
    strategic point of view to package these problems together," he added.

    On Thursday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov echoed Putin at a
    press conference with his Armenian counterpart, Eduard Nalbandian. "To
    try and artificially link those two issues is, in my opinion, not
    correct," Lavrov told reporters in Yerevan. "We are interested in
    this relationship normalizing. The sooner that happens, the better
    for the whole region."

    Turkey and Armenia agreed in October last year to establish diplomatic
    ties and reopen their land border, closed by Ankara in 1993. But the
    accords need parliamentary ratification, a step Turkey says depends
    on Armenia making concessions in the festering conflict with Turkish
    ally Azerbaijan over the breakaway mountain region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

    "I don't want to have the impression, and I think the international
    community also does not, that Turkey is specially blocking the
    ratification of the protocols," Nalbandian said. "What's a reasonable
    timeframe? It's not dragging it out or creating artificial barriers."
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