Ankara has excellent relations with both Russia and Ukraine. Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said this on April 15 in an interview with NTV TV channel.
According to him, now there is a distribution between Kiev and Moscow. Largely because of its positions on Donbass, but Ankara will not support either side and will remain neutral.
Cavusoglu also noted that there are Minsk agreements and it is important to solve the problem in the east of Ukraine through diplomacy.
“Turkey supports the territorial integrity of any country – Ukraine, Russia and everyone else. And we are building relations with both Russia and Ukraine. In the misunderstanding between Ukraine and Russia, we do not support any side, ”the minister said.
The senior diplomat added that there are many ties between Russia and Turkey in various fields.
On April 11, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed hope that Ukraine and Russia will be able to peacefully resolve the existing differences in the near future.
The day before, a meeting between Erdogan and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky took place in Istanbul. After meeting with Zelensky, Erdogan said that Turkey does not recognize the “annexation of Crimea” and supports the sovereignty and integrity of Ukraine. On April 12, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov called on Ankara and other capitals not to react to fueling Kiev’s militaristic sentiments.
In April, it was reported that Ukraine had acquired the Turkish Bayraktar drone drones, and on April 10 it became known about the first use of Bayraktar drones in Donbass.
On April 11, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken announced the White House’s concerns about the fact that “more Russian forces are concentrated on the border between Russia and Ukraine.”
The press secretary of the Russian president Dmitry Peskov said that Russia poses no threat to anyone, and the movement of troops across the country should not bother anyone.
In addition, he noted that the de-escalation of the situation in Donbass will be possible only if Kiev refuses to provoke. Peskov pointed out that Washington could influence Kiev in this matter.
At the same time, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova, expressed the opinion that NATO is inciting Kiev to continue the conflict in Donbass. On April 14, it became known that Kiev had organized military exercises near the border with Crimea.
Crimea became a region of Russia after a referendum held there in the spring of 2014, in which 96.77% of Crimean voters and 95.6% of Sevastopol residents voted to join Russia. Kiev and Western countries refuse to recognize the voting results.
Since a year, Kiev has been conducting a military operation against the residents of Donbass, who refused to recognize the results of the coup in the country. At the same time, the Ukrainian authorities blame Russia for the current situation. Moscow has repeatedly noted that it is not a party to the internal Ukrainian conflict and called on Kiev to negotiate with the self-proclaimed Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics, as well as to implement the Minsk agreements.