President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who made official contacts in three countries last week, will continue his visits abroad in the new week. Erdoğan will first attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) Summit to be held in Uzbekistan. Then he will travel to the United States to attend the 77th United Nations General Assembly (UNGA).
Erdoğan held a Balkan tour covering Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia and Croatia on Sept. 6-8. The SCO Heads of State Summit is to be held in Samarkand, Uzbekistan on Sept. 15-16. There, he will meet with the leaders of member states and all eyes will be on his meeting with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.
Erdoğan's next stop will be the U.S. where he will attend the 77th General Assembly in New York. Erdoğan, who is expected to address the General Assembly on Sept. 20, will give messages to the world on numerous critical topics from the Russia-Ukraine war to grain shipments, from the fight against terrorism to the tension with Greece. He will also speak about issues that Türkiye will never compromise on. Erdoğan's contact with country leaders will continue in New York and he will meet face to face with many heads of state and government on the margins of the General Assembly.
A meeting between U.S. President Joe Biden and Erdoğan is also under discussion, a senior Turkish official told Reuters, with Türkiye-Russia relations, U.S. weapons and conflicts in Ukraine and Syria on the agenda.
NATO-member Türkiye has sought to strike a balance between Moscow and Kyiv by criticizing Russia's invasion and selling arms to Ukraine, while opposing Western sanctions and continuing trade, tourism and investment with Russia.
Biden and Erdoğan last met in late June on the sidelines of a NATO summit in Madrid, where Türkiye lifted its veto on Finland and Sweden joining the pact despite fierce opposition to their membership from Russia.
At the end of that summit, Biden said the U.S. supported the sale of F-16 fighter jets to Türkiye, and that he was confident the congressional approval needed for the sale can be obtained.
