Putin to speak at energy congress in Istanbul, meet with Erdogan, Maduro

MOSCOW, October 10. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin will on Monday visit Istanbul, where he will take part in the 23rd World Energy Congress, as well as meet with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Venezuelan leader Nicolas Maduro, the Kremlin reported. This is the first visit by the Russian leader to Turkey since the process of normalization of relations with that country started. Last time Putin visited the Turkish Republic in November last year, when he attended the G20 summit in Antalya. The Kremlin said the Russian president will speak at a special session of the 23rd World Energy Congress. The forum is held by the World Energy Council once in three years in different countries and is one of the most influential sites in its sphere. Russian delegations have regularly taken part in World energy congresses since 1992. Putin will attend the event for the first time. Russia-Turkey ties The key aspect at the talks between Putin and Erdogan on the sidelines of the energy forum will be discussion of urgent issues of the Russian-Turkish relations, the regional and international agenda, the Kremlin said. Bilateral documents are to be signed following the talks. Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov specified that the two countries’ leaders’ meeting will touch upon "issues connected with the course of normalization of the Russian-Turkish relations in all aspects." The international agenda talk will focus on Syria, he underscored. The previous meeting between Putin and Erdogan occurred September 3 shortly before the G20 summit in China’s Hangzhou. Before that, the two countries’ leaders held talks in St. Petersburg August 9. On October 5, Putin and Erdogan, on the Turkish side’s initiative, discussed by phone implementation of large-scale joint projects in the energy sphere, in particular, the construction of Turkey’s first Nuclear Power Plant Akkuyu and the Turkish Stream gas pipeline, as well as Syrian problems. Russian-Turkish contacts in many spheres were halted after Turkey’s Air Force shot down a Russian aircraft in the sky over Syria in November 2015. In about seven months, in late June this year, Putin held a phone conversation with Erdogan, which was a response to the Turkish leader’s message, in which he apologized for the downed Russian bomber and expressed interest in settlement of the situation. After the conversation with Erdogan, the Russian government, on an instruction from the Russian president, engaged in talks with Turkey to restore cooperation in trade and other spheres. Maduro The Kremlin said that besides the meeting with Erdogan, "on the sidelines of the forum there are plans of contacts of the Russian leader with other heads of state as well" who attend the congress, in particular, Venezuelan President Maduro. Earlier, Maduro said he plans to soon meet with his Russian counterpart to discuss various aspects of cooperation between the two countries. He explained that he wants to speak to Putin "to concretize agreements in all spheres - military, financial, economic, agricultural and trade". The previous meeting between Putin and Maduro occurred in late November last year in Tehran. Read more