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Erdoğan says Putin and Zelensky not yet ready for a meeting

02 September 2025 16:10 (UTC +04:00)

"During my bilateral meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, we exchanged views on what could be done to end the Russia-Ukraine war through a just peace," said Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, APA reports.

According to him, energy cooperation was a special topic of discussion during the meeting.

Erdoğan stated that from the very beginning, Türkiye has consistently maintained the position that the Russia-Ukraine conflict can be resolved through negotiations.

"The talks in Istanbul are the clearest proof that this path is open. We must turn the hope for peace into concrete, solution-oriented results. For this, we must resolve the issue at the leadership level. We analyzed Mr. Putin's conclusions from the recent Alaska summit and his thoughts regarding these meetings. His meeting with U.S. President Donald Trump was significant.

We tried to understand Mr. Putin's views on these matters, and we have also had several phone conversations with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. During these talks, we had the opportunity to understand Mr. Zelenskyy’s position regarding Mr. Putin.

We also had the opportunity to revisit the outcomes of the Alaska summit. I consider the approaches of both Mr. Zelenskyy and Mr. Putin to be positive. When I proposed the possibility of continuing the Istanbul process in Türkiye, he responded, “Why not?” However, they are not ready for this yet.