Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that it is possible to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Donald Trump in Istanbul, Turkish state television “TRT Haber“ reported, quoted by BTA.
“Will we be able to bring Putin and Trump together this week to meet in Istanbul – we will try to do this“, said Erdogan. The comment comes after the third round of talks between Russia and Ukraine, which took place this Wednesday in Istanbul.
The forest fires raging in Turkey were the other topic the president touched on.
“We are facing a great disaster and our firefighters have performed heroic deeds in fighting the fire. The extinguishing operation continues with the participation of 27 aircraft and 105 helicopters. 6,000 off-road vehicles and 25,000 personnel have been mobilized,“ the Turkish president said.
A summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and Ukrainian leader Volodymyr Zelensky can only take place as a final step towards concluding a peace agreement, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters earlier today, as quoted by Reuters.
Peskov stressed that such a meeting was unlikely to take place by the end of August, as proposed by Ukraine. He again described the negotiating positions of the two sides as diametrically opposed.