Over the summer, the presidents of Turkey and Russia have met several times to discuss key issues such as the wars in Syria and Ukraine. However, Erdogan is walking a delicate balance, where Turkey has the defense alliance NATO’s second largest army and at the same time tries to have good relations with Russia. Turkey has also said it may block Sweden’s NATO application because of links to Kurdish groups that Turkey claims are terrorists.
Turkey threatens to attack Kurdish areas in Syria
President Erdogan has repeated his threat of a new military invasion of Kurdish-dominated parts of Syria. Turkey claims that the Kurdish armed group that has been most active in the battles against the terrorist group IS is a branch of the terrorist-classified guerrilla PKK. But without President Putin’s approval, Erdogan’s forces risk being attacked by the Syrian regime, which is a close ally of Russia. Hear how Erdogan tries to reconcile with Putin on a range of issues affecting the entire region and why the two presidents need each other.
This episode of P1’s Middle Eastern podcast was recorded directly at the Kulturhuset in Stockholm during the event “Understand the world – meet the Radio Correspondents”.
Cast: Cecilia Uddén and Johan Mathias SommarströmMiddle East correspondents, Besir Kavak reporter at Ekot
Program manager: Jesper Lindau
Producer: Katja Magnusson
Technician: Fabian Begnert
Source: ICELAND NEWS