“Let’s decrease tensions with our rhetoric”, Davutoglu said.
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“Russia has repeatedly violated Turkish borders and the world community was informed about it”, said the prime minister.
German Defense Minister Ursula Von der Leyen, left, and her Turkish counterpart Ismet Yilmaz flanked by two portraits of Turkey’s founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk as they pose for a photo before their talks, in Ankara, Turkey, Thursday, Dec. 3…
A Turkish official says the foreign ministers of Turkey and Russia met Thursday on the sidelines of a Europe security meeting, their first high-level bilateral talks since Turkey downed a Russian fighter jet late last month.
Speaking before the Russian Federal Counsel in Moscow, Putin also once again accused Turkey of buying oil from the Islamic State extremist group, a charge rejected by Turkey and the U.S.
Relations between Russia and Turkey have deteriorated after Turkish Air Force jets shot down the Russian SU-24 bomber when it entered Turkish airspace November 24. The shoot-down, the 1st time a North Atlantic Treaty Organisation country has downed a Russian aircraft in additional than half a century, sparked a bitter falling out between the 2 nations, which had developed strong economic ties.
“Those who were not happy about sanctions imposed against them should not impose sanctions on others”, he said. Moscow has already banned some Turkish food imports as part of a wider retaliatory sanctions package.
Later on Thursday Davutoglu visited Azerbaijan with the aim of increasing gas imports through the Trans-Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP), a key project due to bring 16 billion cubic meters of gas to Europe. “But if anyone thinks that after committing a heinous war crime, the murder of our people, they will get away with (an embargo on) tomatoes or some restrictions on construction and other industries, they are deeply mistaken”, Putin told lawmakers and top officials gathered in an ornate Kremlin hall.
According to the prime minister, sanctions affect both sides.
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Erdogan dismissed the remark as a “lie”, saying that in fact Turkey had suspended the project – and long before the plane incident – because of Russia’s “non-compliance with our demands”.
