Oleksiy Volovych
March 9-10, Ukrainian President P. Poroshenko was in Turkey on a two-day official visit. At the beginning of the first day of the visit the President, together with his wife, Maryna Poroshenko, met with representatives of the Ukrainian and Crimean Tatar communities in Turkey. During this meeting, P. Poroshenko pointed out that one of the main topics of the talks with the Turkish leadership would be the issue of protecting the rights of the Crimean Tatars and coordination of joint actions to return Ukraine's sovereignty over the Crimean Peninsula. The Head of the State expressed his gratitude to the Crimean Tatars for their firm stance on the issue of preservation of the sovereignty, territorial integrity and independence of Ukraine, including non-recognition of Russia’s annexation of the Ukrainian Crimea.
The Meeting of the Presidents of Ukraine and Turkey
During the official meeting of the Presidents of Ukraine and Turkey, R. Erdogan met P. Poroshenko at the main entrance to the Presidential palace. The anthems of the two countries were performed and an artillery salvo was given.
Then the Presidents had talks in the one-on-one format. P. Poroshenko thanked the Turkish government for “Turkey's strong and consistent support for Ukraine’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, which were grossly violated by Russia”. P. Poroshenko thanked the Turkish President for the help that is provided to Ukraine in these difficult times: a loan of 50 million dollars, as well as allocation of 10 million US dollars for humanitarian needs; rehabilitation of injured participants of the ATO at Turkish resorts, financing and settling of thousands of the Crimean Tatars, who were forced to leave the Crimea, transfer of five mobile hospitals for the Armed Forces of Ukraine.
During the joint press conference with President R. Erdogan, the head of the Ukrainian state told about the agreement reached with the President of Turkey on initiating creation of new international formats, including the “Geneva Plus” format with the participation of the guarantors of the Budapest Memorandum, Turkey and Ukraine to discuss ways and means of de-occupation of the Crimea and Donbas.
According to the President of Ukraine, the question of the occupation of the Ukrainian peninsula by Russia was one of the key issues during the negotiations. The parties stressed the unacceptability of the Crimea's being militarized and actually turned into a military base as a result of its temporary occupation. Among other things, the two leaders discussed violation of human rights in the Russian-occupied Crimea and oppression of both, representatives of the Crimean Tatars and Ukrainian patriots, and representatives of other peoples. The parties condemned the actions of the Russian occupying authorities, who massively violate fundamental human rights and freedoms, forcing people to take Russian citizenship, conducting a deliberate policy to change the population structure, to displace ethnic Ukrainians and Crimean Tatars from the Peninsular, and prohibit the use of the Ukrainian language as well as oppress the Ukrainian Church.
In his turn, the Turkish leader said that Turkey has always supported and will always support the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine, has never recognized the annexation of the Crimea and is not going to recognize it in the future.
The Fifth Meeting of the Strategic Council
Under the chairmanship of the Presidents of the two countries was held the fifth meeting of the Turkey-Ukraine High Level Strategic Council, by the results of which the Presidents of Ukraine and Turkey signed a joint Declaration of 21 points. The parties have agreed to contribute fully to the development of bilateral economic and investment cooperation, to diversify and increase the volume of bilateral trade, development of transport, telecommunications and industrial infrastructure. They formalized the agreement to activate and complete during 2016 negotiations concluding of the agreement on free trade area, agreement on avoidance of double taxation and agreement on mutual protection of investments.
Ukraine and the Republic of Turkey intend to intensify cooperation in the sphere of the military-industrial complexes of the two countries to strengthen their defence capabilities, as well as to implement joint high-tech projects in the sphere of space, aircraft and defence industries. Ukraine and Turkey have pledged to contribute to strengthening of mechanisms of regional security in the Black Sea, to develop cooperation within the framework of NATO, to carry out joint steps towards de-occupation of the Crimea, to strengthen cooperation within the UN, the Council of Europe, the OSCE, in order to restore Ukraine’s sovereignty over the Peninsula, to protect the rights of Ukrainian citizens, the Crimean Tatars included.
Ukraine and Turkey intend to deepen their cooperation in bilateral and multilateral projects in the energy sector, in particular in the field of natural gas supply through the use of the Ukrainian gas transportation infrastructure and the Parties' participation in the projects on natural gas supplies from the Caspian basin to Europe. The sides also agreed on development of cooperation in information-sharing for the use of nuclear energy for peaceful purposes, as well as education in the field of nuclear energy and response to emergencies in the nuclear sphere.
The Sides agreed to expand cooperation in the sphere of international combined container traffic between Turkey and Ukraine, to intensify cooperation in the tourism sphere, in particular by increasing the number of tourist projects and providing support to Ukrainian tour operators. Considerable attention during the meeting of the Strategic Council was paid to the two countries' cooperation in the humanitarian sphere, in particular, the Parties have agreed to strengthen cooperation in education, to allocate additional quotas for the Crimean Tatar youth in Turkish schools, to create additional conditions for studying the Turkish language and literature in Ukraine and the Ukrainian language and literature in Turkey. It has been planned to open in Kyiv a Center of the Turkish Culture named after Yunus Emre. An agreement was reached on cooperation in the sphere of information in order to enhance contacts and coordination between the media of the two countries.
President P. Poroshenko pointed out that the golden thread of the whole text of the Joint Declaration signed on the results of the fifth meeting of the High-level Strategic Council, “is deepening of the strategic alliance between Ukraine and Turkey”. Ukrainian President stressed that in the nearest future some other countries may join the bilateral cooperation between Ukraine and Turkey. According to some analysts, we can talk about creation of the Baltic-Black Sea alliance composed of Sweden, Poland, Lithuania, Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Turkey, which can then be joined by other Eastern European countries.
High Level Meetings
On the first day of the visit of Ukrainian President to Turkey were also held a number of important high-level meetings. P. Poroshenko met with Chairman of the Grand National Assembly of Turkey Ismail Kahraman. The head of the Ukrainian state expressed the Ukrainian side's being interested in deepening inter-parliamentary cooperation with the Republic of Turkey on a bilateral level and within international organizations. The Ukrainian President thanked Turkey for its support in the issue of opposition to human rights violations in the occupied Crimea. The head of the Turkish Parliament confirmed the non-recognition of the annexation of the Crimea and the support for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Ukraine. I. Kahraman informed P. Poroshenko about the creation of the Group of Friendship with Ukraine in the Turkish Parliament.
During the meeting of the President of Ukraine with the Prime Minister of Turkey Ahmet Davutoglu, the main attention was focused on the prospects of cooperation between the two countries in trade and economic sphere, as well as in the field of investments, energy engineering and transport. P. Poroshenko pointed out the importance of accelerating the negotiations on the conclusion of the Agreement on Free trade area between Ukraine and Turkey. The two sides agreed to develop closer cooperation in joint participation in the development of energy infrastructure and implementation of international energy corridors. The sides stressed the importance of ensuring the full use of the transit potential of Ukraine and Turkey.
The second day of the official visit of Ukrainian President to Turkey was also full of important events and meetings. President of Ukraine met with representatives of leading Turkish business circles and informed the Turkish businessmen about the opportunities of economic and investment cooperation in Ukraine, in particular, of participation in the privatization of Ukrainian industrial and agricultural facilities and creation of joint ventures.
President of Ukraine P. Poroshenko visited the flagship of the Ukrainian Navy, frigate “Hetman Sahaydachnyi”, which is participating in joint exercises with the Turkish Navy in the Sea of Marmara. The Commander of the training cruise, 2nd Rank Captain Dmytro Hlukhov and the Commander of the frigate “Hetman Sahaydachnyi” 2nd Rank Captain Denys Ivanin showed the President the uniform and mobile military hospital supplied by the Turkish side.
Within the framework of his official visit to the Republic of Turkey, the President and his wife, Mrs. Maryna met with the Archbishop of Constantinople, New Rome and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, to whom Poroshenko expressed gratitude for the moral support to the Ukrainian people in times of hardship. During the meeting, they talked about the future of Ukraine, about the world, about the United Local Orthodox Church, so much wanted and expected by the Ukrainian people. In his turn, the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I pointed out that the Constantinople Church is the mother church of the Ukrainian nation. Recently, in Istanbul, the Constantinople patriarchy opened St. Nicholas' Church, where the Ukrainian society meets.
In an interview with the Turkish TV channel TRT World, P. Poroshenko pointed out that Ukraine within a year would return peacefully the control over the occupied territories of Donetsk and Luhansk regions. In particular, the President said: “I hate the war with Russia, but as the Commander in Chief, I must defend Ukraine”. Asked about the political crisis in Ukraine, P. Poroshenko denied the possibility of announcing of early parliamentary elections and said he was ready to cooperate with any Prime Minister. At this, he stressed that the parliamentary political forces have to find a way out of the situation and expressed willingness to accept any choice of the Parliament. Asked about his attitude to the Prime Minister A. Yatsenyuk, P. Poroshenko said: “I have a fantastic personal relationship with the Prime Minister. I believe that he is a reformer, and he is doing an excellent job”.
So, within the past few months, Ukraine and Turkey have done more to deepen their strategic partnership than it has been done over the last years.
Ukrainian President’s official visit to Turkey has become an extremely important event in the bilateral Ukrainian-Turkish relations in the way of their transformation from partnership into an alliance that will strengthen the sovereignty and raise the credibility of our country in the international arena.
