Turkey

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Wednesday (May 19th) expressed hope that talks aimed at reunifying Cyprus will continue, yet acknowledged they can’t last forever.  Ban said that February statements by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan — in support of the negotiations — added momentum to the process. Ban said …

United Kingdom Foreign Secretary William Hague says the new British government firmly supports the EU integration prospects of Turkey and the Western Balkans, the Spanish daily El Pais reported on Tuesday (May 18th). Hague, who was in Spain to attend the

The Georgian president said relations between Turkey and Georgia are “exemplary” during a visit by the Turkish prime minister to the Black Sea resort city of Batumi on Monday. Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili’s remarks came while he was speaking during the ribbon-cutting ceremony of the Sheraton Batumi Hotel, built by …

The Bulgarian nationalist party VMRO and its partner cable TV channel SKAT have collected 200 000 signatures in support of their demand for a nation-wide referendum on Turkey’s EU accession. The VMRO press center announced Tuesday that the signatures were collected in one month, and that the initiative of the …

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited Azerbaijan on Monday and discussed bilateral cooperation with Azerbaijani leaders, Xinhua informed. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, who had a meeting with Erdogan in Baku, expressed satisfaction with the current state of cooperation between the two countries.

Macedonian Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski is set to meet Spain’s Deputy Prime Minister Maria Teresa de la Vega and prime ministers of Turkey Redzep Taip Erdogan and Croatia Jadranka Kosor, the government sources told Makfax news agency. The meeting is in the frameworks of the EU-Latin countries summit, where Macedonia …

Romania supported a lasting solution to the Cyprus problem accepted by both sides within the UN framework, Romanian Foreign Minister Teodor Baconschi reiterated on Friday. Meeting with his visiting Cypriote counterpart Markos Kyprianou, Baconschi stressed that Romania hopes that “this problem, which was imported by the European Union, will find …

Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan made a landmark visit to Athens on Friday (May 14th) amid tight security, in a bid to resolve longstanding issues between the two neighbours. The two governments signed a total of 21 agreements, declarations and memorandums, covering such issues as

Turkish Prime Minister Redzep Erdogan will kick off his 2-day visit to Greece, aimed at improving Greek-Turkish ties. He will be accompanied by another 10 Turkish ministers and over 100 Turkish businessmen. A visit to Greece by Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan this week marks “the start of a …

Talk of a timeline for Cypriot reunification from the United Nations’ secretary-general would represent an important success in the peace process, according to a Turkish diplomat. Mentioning – even indirectly – a timeline for the completion of the talks by [U.N. Secretary-General] Mr. Ban Ki-moon in his to-be-released Goodwill Mission …