Biden eyes to fortify Turkey relations in first meet with Erdogan

Washington, June 14 (IANS) In a bid to stabilise the troubled ties with Turkey, US President Joe Biden is heading to his first face-to-face meeting with his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan in Brussels.

As strategic partners in global affairs, Washington and Ankara will be meeting each other on the sidelines of the NATO summit on Monday, amid long-standing tensions over a host of geopolitical issues.

One of the significant points of conflict with its NATO ally members is Turkey's possession of the Russian S-400 missile defence system.

However, signalling to avoid direct confrontation with Ankara, Biden had directly communicated with Erdogan ahead of his decision to recognise the Armenian genocide, which Turkey rejects.

"Biden doesn't have much interest in or expectations from Erdogan beyond pursuing a few transactional deals, such as further US-Turkish cooperation in Afghanistan and Ankara de-escalating tensions in the Eastern Mediterranean in exchange for Euro-American goodwill," said Aykan Erdemir, senior Director of the Turkey programme with the Foundation for Defence of Democracies, and a former member of the Turkish Parliament.