Putin meets Fidan, ‘fully supports’ Turkey’s aspirations in BRICS

ANKARA — Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, held a meeting on Tuesday with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan, their first since Fidan took the position in June and reinforced Moscow’s support for including Turkey in the BRICS bloc. 

Speaking ahead of the meeting, which took place on the sidelines of the BRICS+ foreign ministers meeting in western Russia, Putin expressed support closer ties between Turkey and the China-led bloc.

“We welcome Turkey’s interest in the work of BRICS,” Putin told Fidan at the closed-door meeting. “Undoubtedly, we will fully support this aspiration and desire to be together with the countries of this union, to be closer,” he added.

While this was the first meeting with Putin, it was Fidan’s second visit to Russia as the country’s top diplomat, following his first trip to Turkey’s Black Sea neighbor last August. During his two-day visit, the Turkish official also met with his Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, and the head of Russia’s Federal Security Service Sergei Naryshkin, according to Turkey’s public broadcaster, TRT.

Fidan’s meeting with Putin comes merely a week after Putin subtly criticized Turkey over its deepening ties with Western financial institutions.

Turkey “has focused on obtaining loans, making investments, and receiving grants from Western financial institutions. This is probably not a bad thing,” Putin was quoted as saying by Turkey’s state-run Anadolu Agency.

“But if it is related to the restriction of trade and economic relations with Russia, then the Turkish economy will lose more than it gains. I think there is such a threat,” he added, according to Anadolu. He was speaking at a press conference on June 5.

Decline in imports 

As Fidan was holding talks with the Russian officials, World Bank President Ajay Banga was in Ankara meeting with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek.

Simsek and Banga discussed the “Country Cooperation Framework Program” between Turkey and the World Bank, Anadolu reported. Banga’s first visit to Turkey came after the financial institution in April doubled its exposure, including direct loans, to Turkey to $35 billion as part of the program.

Ankara has been under Western scrutiny amid accusations that Russia was using Turkey to circumvent international sanctions over the war in Ukraine. The US Treasury has imposed sanctions on dozens of Turkey-based companies since the start of the war.

But US Ambassador to Ankara Jeff Flake said last month that the United States was “getting better results working” with Turkish authorities to clamp down on Russia using Turkey to bypass sanctions.

The country imports more than 44% of its natural gas from Russia, but amid increasing pressure from the West, in particular the United States, those gas imports have declined. 

Between January and April, Russia’s exports stood at $15 billion, a large sum but $2 billion less than the corresponding period of the previous year, according to data released last month by the Turkish Statistical Institute, TurkStat.

Speaking on Tuesday, Putin acknowledged the decline but said, “We attribute this primarily to the adjustment in prices for our main export and import goods. I hope that we will be able to correct this situation in the near future.”

Turkey, which has been pursuing a balancing act between its NATO allies and Moscow, hasn’t joined Western sanctions against Russia but has blocked Russian warships from accessing the Bosphorus and Dardanelles Straits linking the Aegean and Black seas. It also supplies ammunition and drones to Ukraine.

Speaking last week, Putin also criticized Kyiv, claiming that the Ukrainian armed forces were using Turkish drones to hit undersea pipelines in the Black Sea supplying natural gas to Turkey.

“Ukraine tries to hit the pipelines carrying gas to [Turkey]. This is not a joke or an exaggeration in any way,” the Russian leader said. “Please inform our friend President Erdogan about the facts regarding this matter,” he added.

Turkish officials earlier this year announced that Putin was going to travel to Turkey in February, but the visit, which was never confirmed by the Russian side, didn’t take place.

Putin said on Tuesday that he was expecting to meet with Erdogan in person on July 3-4 in the Kazakh capital of Astana on the sidelines of an international event.