A normalization process has begun between Turkey and Russia, Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yıldırım said June 28, a day after President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan penned a letter to his Russian counterpart to express his deep sorrow over the downing of a Russianwarplane previous year.
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In footage later aired on Russian state television, pro-Turkish rebels fired automatic rifles at the Russian pilot as he parachuted to the ground.
Ankara announced the restoration of diplomatic ties with Israel on Monday after a six-year rupture, and sought to mend strained alliances with Russian Federation.
The phone conversation, which lasted at least 40 minutes according to the sources, was the first since Russia-Turkey relations became strained by the downing of a Russian jet over Syria in November of 2015. In an effort to mend ties with Russia, Erdogan earlier this week sent a letter to Putin expressing regret over the incident and the death of a pilot by the Syrian border.
Russian Federation is one of the closest allies of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, while Turkey supports opposition groups there.
He said: “Turkey and Russian Federation have agreed to take necessary steps without delay to improve bilateral relations”.
“President Putin has expressed a few times his willingness to maintain good relations with Turkey and the Turkish people”, Peskov said.
“Together we will have to take more than one step to meet each other”, Peskov said.
He will also drop restriction measures against Russian tourists visiting Turkey, the statement by the Russian side added.
In parallel, the Kremlin confirmed that Putin had received a letter from his Turkish counterpart apologizing for the killing of the Russian pilot of the SU-24 bomber that was downed by Turkey’s aircraft in Syrian airspaces previous year. In addition, being the most important countries, it is also not in the interest of world community that strain in Moscow-Ankara relations lingers on as this will not contribute to addressing regional issues like that of Syria but add further complexities to it.
Erdogan said at a dinner to break the Ramadan fast on Monday night that he hoped for a “quick” normalisation in ties with Moscow.
Putin described the murder of Russian pilot as “a stab in the back delivered by accomplices of the terrorists”, imposed economic restrictions on Turkey and demanded an apology. Turkey’s worst nightmare in Syria has meanwhile come true: Russian support has enabled Assad to remain in power, while Kurdish militia fighters have benefited from US support as they battle Islamic State, bolstering their position in territory adjacent to the Turkish border.
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Moscow also suspended all military deals with Ankara. “Turkish foreign policy is not going through a grand revision”, he said.
