The Turkish President met Guterres and Zelenskiy in Lviv to find a “diplomatic solution”. What are Erdoğan’s goals?
Without them, there would have been no grain agreement between Kyiv and Moscow, and 43 grain trucks would have been able to leave Ukraine: Recep Tayyip Erdogan Turkish President, and Anthony Guterres, UN Secretary General traveled to Lemberg (Lviv) on Thursday with diplomatic successes in their luggage to meet the Ukrainian President there Volodymyr Selensky hold true.
While Guterres dampened expectations, Erdoğan acted as a mediator beforehand: Nothing less than “ending the war between Ukraine and Russia through diplomatic channels” should be discussed.
Good contacts
The Turkish President maintains good contacts with both warring parties – that is undisputed. Turkish drones are deployed in Ukraine, and many Ukrainian refugees have found refuge in Turkish cities. Turkey is primarily linked to Russia by economic interests.
However, a diplomatic solution to the Ukraine war is a long way off: “At the moment I don’t see any chance of a possible peace agreement. Both sides are convinced that military successes will bring them to a position of strength and that they can dictate conditions from there,” estimates Russia expert Gerhard Mangott the situation to the KURIER.
“In my view, Ukraine can only reach its desired position of strength through successful counter-offensives – and many military analysts are convinced that it lacks both weapons and soldiers,” says Mangott. “What they manage are attacks on Russian infrastructure behind the front, but this delays the Russian attack – not repels it.”
At the moment it is also not foreseeable that Ukrainian associations could take the city of Cherson in the south before the start of winter. The reports from Kyiv regarding a one-million-man army have so far turned out to be wishful thinking.
All of this would mean that Russian forces would occupy the west bank of the Dnieper River and be in a better position to launch an offensive on Odessa in the spring.
In the Donbass, Russian troops continue to advance slowly and steadily. “In my opinion, if Putin took over the entire Donbass, he could propose a ceasefire, which Kyiv could reject,” says Mangott. “That would lead to tensions between Western states. Between those who support the ceasefire and those who reject it. That would also have brought Putin a little closer to another goal – the division of the West.”
good relationship
Erdoğan has been trying for months to bring Putin and Zelenskiy to a table in Turkey, but there is no interest from the Russian side. “The main purpose of this meeting in Lviv was to evaluate the grain agreement and to discuss the situation at the Zaporizhia nuclear power plant,” says Mangott, who teaches at the University of Innsbruck. Nevertheless, he does not rule out that Turkey could be involved in a peace process in the more distant future.
Even if Ankara and Moscow are on different sides in foreign policy – for example in Syria, Libya, Nagorno-Karabakh – Erdoğan and Putin maintain a good relationship: “Both appreciate each other for their toughness on some issues, both are autocrats – and especially in terms of economic interdependence Russia and Turkey are dependent on each other,” said Mangott.
Erdoğan in particular is under massive pressure in view of a veritable economic crisis in his country: In polls, his party has lost more than twelve percentage points and is only just ahead of the Kemalist party CHP. The polls for the presidential election also looked bleak for Erdoğan before the Ukraine war. For the first time, the CHP candidate was in front of him. Since he has been active as a foreign policy mediator, his values have risen again. He also softened his tone towards Israel and wanted to build stronger alliances. But back to Ukraine. When would Kyiv be ready to negotiate?