Turkey agrees to pay for gas in rubles: results of the meeting between Erdogan and Putin
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan and Russian President Vladimir Putin agreed on Friday to strengthen cooperation after a four-hour meeting, a joint statement by the two nations cited revealed.
As part of the deal, which will increase cooperation in the transport, agriculture, finance and construction sectors and present a seemingly united front against "terrorist organizations" in Syria, Turkey has agreed to change its payment methods. to Russia for natural gas. Under the new agreement, Turkey agreed to pay Russia partially in rubles, Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak said after the meeting.
Russian President Vladimir Putin announced months ago that unfriendly nations would have to pay for Russian energy through a ruble account to insulate Russia from the effects of Western sanctions. Although Russia does not view Turkey as a hostile nation, paying rubles for Russian natural gas would protect those payments from sanctions and could smooth things out with Moscow, which might otherwise frown on Turkey's activities in Syria.
Last month, Turkey also helped broker a grain transport deal between Russia and Ukraine, further strengthening ties between Russia and Turkey.
Turkey opposes the Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK) and its affiliate, the YPG, long regarded by Turkey, the US and the EU as a terrorist group, which has been leading an insurgency against the Turkish government for decades in support of the Kurdish minorities in Turkey. Russia has strong ties with Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, who controls most of the airspace in northern Syria, so the deal probably involved the situation of Kurds in that country, currently torn between an alliance with the American forces remaining and one with Assad.
Erdogan, who will face elections next year, is in a complicated situation, with Turkey experiencing skyrocketing annual inflation of nearly 80%. The economic crisis would no doubt deepen without Russian gas supplies. It is not impossible that the two sides, in the context of financial cooperation, have studied some ways to allow Ankara to take advantage in some way of the enormous reserves in hard currency that Moscow is accumulating.
Turkey imports nearly half of the gas it uses from Russia.
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The article Turkey agrees to pay for gas in Rubles: results of the meeting between Erdogan and Putin comes from ScenariEconomici.it .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/la-turchia-accetta-di-pagare-il-gas-in-rubli-risultati-dellincontro-fra-erdogan-e-putin/ on Sun, 07 Aug 2022 17:23:15 +0000.