Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan expressed readiness to mend ties between Türkiye and Syria, emphasizing his country's desire to restore Türkiye-Syria relations to their previous levels.
If Syrian President Bashar al-Assad takes a step toward improving relations with Türkiye, "we will respond positively to that approach," Erdogan said.
Regarding his hinted invitation to al-Assad for a visit last week, the Turkish president reiterated his willingness on this matter. "We will extend our invitation," he said, adding "it can happen any time."
"Now we are at a stage where as soon as Bashar al-Assad takes a step towards improving relations with Turkey, we will do the same. Because before we were not enemies with Syria, we met with Assad as a family. We can direct our invitations at any time. We hope that thanks to this we will be able to bring Turkish-Syrian relations to the same level as in the past. Putin has his own views on holding a meeting in Turkey. The Prime Minister of Iraq also has his own approaches to this issue" Erdogan said.
The Turkish leader said that Russian President Vladimir Putin is considering the option of holding negotiations on normalizing relations between Ankara and Damascus.
"We always talk about mediation, but why can’t our neighbors be mediators?" Erdogan said.
