Turkey’s Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu addresses the media in Ankara, Turkey, July 29, 2016.
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Erdogan’s visit is his first foreign trip since the abortive putsch, in which more than 240 people were killed.
Meanwhile, Erdogan expressed happiness over Russia’s high-level phone call after the failed coup attempt.
Cavusoglu said the first bilateral meeting of this mechanism will be held in St. Petersburg on Thursday, Xinhua news agency cited from Anadolu news Agency.
The West has also been highly critical of the Turkish government’s post-coup crackdown, which has seen some 60,000 people in the military, judiciary, civil service, and education fired, of whom 16,000 have been arrested and detained.
Dismissals continued at Turkey’s Scientific and Technological Research Council (Tubitak), which has now removed 560 staff, private broadcaster NTV said on Wednesday.
The visit was closely watched in the West, where some fear that both men, powerful leaders critics say are ill-disposed to dissent, might use their rapprochement to exert pressure on Washington and the European Union and stir tensions within North Atlantic Treaty Organisation, the military alliance of which Turkey is a member. Turkish officials dismiss such claims, saying the purges are justified by the gravity of the threat posed by the putsch.
Analysts say that Erdogan may also be hoping to play the Russian card to strengthen his hand in disputes with the United States and European Union.
“The region has expectations of us politically. Our Alliance is committed to collective defence and founded on the principles of democracy, individual liberty, human rights and the rule of law”.
There were no such recriminations after Putin met with Erdogan in St. Petersburg on August 9, however, with Putin acknowledging Bulgaria’s interest in reviving South Stream, but pointing out that after losing money when the project was abandoned, Russian Federation now required iron-clad legal guarantees for the project to go ahead.
Calling Putin his “dear friend”, Erdogan said Turkey is ready to implement a natural gas pipeline project with Russian Federation and a deal to build Turkey’s first nuclear power plant.
“Our relations with Russian Federation are not a message to the West”.
He said the visit of Erdogan, despite the hard political situation in Turkey caused by the failed coup attempt on July 15, showed that Ankara really wanted to restore bilateral cooperation.
This is their first meeting since Turkey downed a Russian warplane last November for alleged air space violation.
However, they do not agree on the way forward in Syria.
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Turkey has been accused by Russian Federation of supporting Syrian rebel groups, and the two sides have also differences on the support for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad and the Kurdish issue, among others.
