عربي English Türkçe اردو فارسى
Logo
Latest News
Arab World

Turkish FM in Erbil, Discusses Security, Trade Relations

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. (Reuters)
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. (Reuters)
TT
TT

Turkish FM in Erbil, Discusses Security, Trade Relations

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. (Reuters)
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu. (Reuters)

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu held talks in Erbil on Monday with several Kurdish officials on his first visit to the region since a failed independence referendum in 2017 that strained ties with Ankara.

His discussions focused on bolstering security and trade relations.

He held closed-door meetings with the officials from the Iraqi Turkmen Front. Talks focused on Turkmen living in Iraq and the Kurdistan Region.

Cavusoglu stressed that Ankara will continue to push for Turkmen to obtain their rights in Iraq seeing as they make up the third largest minority in the country.

The minister then met with Kurdistan intelligence chief Masrour Barzani, who could potentially be tasked with forming a new Kurdistan government. He then met with President of the Kurdistan Region Nechirvan Barzani. He concluded his visit by holding talks with Qubad Talabani, a senior member of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.

Informed sources said that talks also focused on efforts to confront the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) that has led an insurgency against Turkey and is based on the border between Iraq, Iran and Turkey.

A senior member of Masoud Barzani’s Kurdistan Democratic Party, Abdulsalam Brawri revealed to Asharq Al-Awsat that Cavusoglu’s trip was aimed at finding alternatives to Iranian oil in wake of Washington’s decision to halt exemptions on its export.

Moreover, he said that Ankara was also seeking to invest in efforts to reconstruct Iraq.

Cavusoglu had arrived in Erbil after holding talks with Iraqi officials in Baghdad.

During the visit he unveiled plans to reopen consulates in Mosul and Basra and to establish new ones in Kirkuk and Najaf.

The minister also announced that Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan would pay a visit to Iraq before the end of the year.

Most Viewed

 
 
Arab World

Lebanon’s Jumblatt Visits Syria, Hoping for a Post-Assad Reset in Troubled Relations

Walid Jumblatt (C), the Druze former leader of Lebanon's Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), and his son and current party head Taymur Jumblatt (C-L) meet with Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (R) and interim prime minister Mohammad al-Bashir (L) during a visit to Damascus on December 22, 2024. (AFP)
Walid Jumblatt (C), the Druze former leader of Lebanon's Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), and his son and current party head Taymur Jumblatt (C-L) meet with Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (R) and interim prime minister Mohammad al-Bashir (L) during a visit to Damascus on December 22, 2024. (AFP)
TT
TT

Lebanon’s Jumblatt Visits Syria, Hoping for a Post-Assad Reset in Troubled Relations

Walid Jumblatt (C), the Druze former leader of Lebanon's Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), and his son and current party head Taymur Jumblatt (C-L) meet with Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (R) and interim prime minister Mohammad al-Bashir (L) during a visit to Damascus on December 22, 2024. (AFP)
Walid Jumblatt (C), the Druze former leader of Lebanon's Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), and his son and current party head Taymur Jumblatt (C-L) meet with Syrian leader Ahmed al-Sharaa (R) and interim prime minister Mohammad al-Bashir (L) during a visit to Damascus on December 22, 2024. (AFP)

Former head of Lebanon’s Progressive Socialist Party (PSP), Druze leader Walid Jumblatt held talks on Sunday with Hayat Tahrir al-Sham leader Ahmed al-Sharaa, whose group led the overthrow of Syria's President Bashar Assad, with both expressing hope for a new era in relations between their countries.

Jumblatt was a longtime critic of Syria's involvement in Lebanon and blamed Assad's father, former President Hafez Assad, for the assassination of his own father decades ago. He is the most prominent Lebanese politician to visit Syria since the Assad family's 54-year rule came to an end.

“We salute the Syrian people for their great victories and we salute you for your battle that you waged to get rid of oppression and tyranny that lasted over 50 years,” said Jumblatt.

He expressed hope that Lebanese-Syrian relations “will return to normal.”

Jumblatt's father, Kamal, was killed in 1977 in an ambush near a Syrian roadblock during Syria's military intervention in Lebanon's civil war. The younger Jumblatt was a critic of the Assads, though he briefly allied with them at one point to gain influence in Lebanon's ever-shifting political alignments.

“Syria was a source of concern and disturbance, and its interference in Lebanese affairs was negative,” al-Sharaa said, referring to the Assad government. “Syria will no longer be a case of negative interference in Lebanon," he said, pledging that it would respect Lebanese sovereignty.

Al-Sharaa also repeated longstanding allegations that Assad's government was behind the 2005 assassination of former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri, which was followed by other killings of prominent Lebanese critics of Assad.

Last year, the United Nations closed an international tribunal investigating the assassination after it convicted three members of Lebanon's Hezbollah — an ally of Assad — in absentia. Hezbollah denied involvement in the massive Feb. 14, 2005 bombing, which killed Hariri and 21 others.

“We hope that all those who committed crimes against the Lebanese will be held accountable, and that fair trials will be held for those who committed crimes against the Syrian people,” Jumblatt said.