YEREVAN, JUNE 12, ARMENPRESS. No significant changes will happen in the Armenian-Turkish normalization process after the 2023 Turkish general election, a senior researcher has warned.
Turkey will maintain its precondition on Armenia’s normalization with Azerbaijan, an important factor for Turkey’s foreign policy, Professor Ruben Safrastyan told ARMENPRESS when asked about the prospects of Armenian-Turkish normalization after the elections.
Safrastyan, noting that Azerbaijan recently postponed a planned foreign ministerial with Armenia, and that the new Erdogan government has discussed the Armenian-Azerbaijani talks during its first session, said that “something is in the works” in Ankara, the results of which will be seen in a few days.
Moreover, Safrastyan claims that Azerbaijan actually postponed the foreign ministerial talks with Armenia planned in Washington on June 12 at new Turkish FM Hakan Fidan’s request.
“The new foreign minister Hakan Fidan has expressed some discontent over the Armenian-Azerbaijani negotiations process, and the Azerbaijani side postponed that meeting at his request. Given Fidan’s previous work and his skills in covert diplomacy, it’s clear that Azerbaijan’s maximalist demands put forward to Armenia at his mediation will become stronger. Tomorrow Erdogan will visit Azerbaijan. He had announced that he would make his first visit as newly elected President to Azerbaijan. Erdogan will present Turkey’s approach to Ilham Aliyev during that visit,” Safrastyan, the Director of the Institute of Oriental Studies at National Academy of Sciences said.
The turkologist also pointed out the fact that Erdogan changed the entire Cabinet, whereas in the past he used to keep some of the ministers in place.
Professor Safrastyan noted that Erdogan has appointed his long-time loyalists to key positions, such as Hakan Fidan, who was the head of national intelligence and is now the foreign minister, and Ibrahim Kalin, Erdogan’s long-time spokesperson who is now the head of national intelligence.