President Tayyip Erdogan said on Monday a meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin would ‘bring hope’ in the region.
Speaking to reporters ahead of talks on Syria with the Russian strongman in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi, Erdogan said that a joint statement due to be made after his meeting with Putin would bring ‘new hope’ to the region, Reuters news agency reported.
Earlier, Hurriyet newspaper quoted Erdogan as telling reporters on a flight back from Azerbaijan at the weekend that Turkey’s calls for a ceasefire in Syria’s Idlib region were ‘bearing fruit’.
“The situation in Idlib has been calm for three days. It looks like we obtained a result with the efforts which were made.”
“But we are still not satisfied,” he said. Turkey, with 3.5 million Syrian refugees, has already borne the “political and human burden” of Syria’s seven-year-old conflict and any new refugee flow would head for Turkey, Erdogan told reporters.
“We are trying to protect the pure, clean, innocent people there with these observation posts,” Erdogan said.
“But currently everybody can see the regime’s mercilessness and the terror which they are spreading there. There is a terror state.”
The northern province Idlib is considered as the last bastion of foreign-backed Takfiri terrorists in Syria.
“Let’s all take steps, measures together against the terror groups among the opposition in Idlib,” Erdogan said according to the Turkish daily.
“But let’s not create an excuse and take a step like bombing there.”
Source: Agencies
