Turkey Ready To Host Russia-Ukraine Peace Talks

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan with Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan/PHOTO via Instagram @hakanfidan.2023

JAKARTA - Turkey has stated that it is ready to host possible negotiations between Ukraine and Russia.

Ankara supports any initiative that leads to peace following Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov's visit to Ankara.

Turkey, a NATO member who hosted the initial talks between the two sides months after Russia's invasion of Ukraine in 2022, helped secure an agreement for a safe route of grain exports in the Black Sea.

Speaking with Lavrov on the third anniversary of Russia's invasion, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said Ankara appreciated the US peace initiative as a "result-oriented" approach, but repeated that both sides must participate in achieving a solution.

"In that framework, we are ready to contribute all forms of support for peace to be achieved through negotiations. We are ready to host these negotiations as we have done before," Fidan said.

Although he did not repeat Ankara's longstanding stance in support of Ukraine's territorial integrity, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan repeated it in a separate video message marking the warning.

When asked about Ukraine's security guarantees from the United States and its Western partners to end the war, Fidan said Ankara was "ready to take any steps that principledly contribute to peace."

Lavrov said Russia's position on necessary requirements to end the war had not changed and Ukraine's cancellation of its offer to become a NATO member was non-negotiable. He then met Erdogan.

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy visited Turkey for talks with Erdogan last week, on the same day US and Russian representatives met to hold talks aimed at ending the war in Riyadh without Kyiv's participation.

Zelenskyy said on Sunday he saw Turkey as an important security guarantor for Ukraine.