ANKARA
With the goal of achieving world peace, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had a busy diplomatic agenda this year, as he made 27 visits to 21 countries.
Erdogan, one of the only leaders able to communicate with the presidents of Russia and Ukraine as both countries stage devastating wars, was instrumental in launching the Black Sea grain initiative, which served as an important lifeline for the world’s food supply.
Hosting many foreign leaders throughout the year, President Erdogan has also made domestic visits where he has witnessed mass inaugurations.
Visits abroad
On his first trip abroad this year, President Erdogan left for Tirana, Albania’s capital, on January 17 at the invitation of Prime Minister Edi Rama. On February 3, Erdogan traveled to Ukraine’s capital, Kyiv, to attend the 10th. Strategic Council with President Zelenskyy.
On February 14 and 15, Erdogan paid a UAE official at the invitation of Abu Dhabi’s crown prince, Sheikh Mohammed bin Zayed Al Nahyan.
Erdogan then visited the Democratic Republic of Congo on February 20, and then visited Senegal for the next two days.
He left for Brussels, the Belgian capital, on March 24 to attend an ordinary summit of NATO heads of state and government. On the sidelines, Erdogan met with French President Emmanuel Macron, then-Italian Prime Minister Mario Draghi, Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas and then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson.
At the invitation of his Uzbek counterpart Shavkat Mirziyoyev, Erdogan traveled to Tashkent, the capital of Uzbekistan, on March 29-30, and attended the current meeting of the Council for High-Level Strategic Cooperation among the countries. He also visited the ciudad. de Khiva, a vital site in Turkish Islamic history.
On April 29, the Turkish president visited Jeddah, the capital of Saudi Arabia, at the invitation of King Salman bin Abdulaziz Al Saud.
To express his condolences on the death of UAE President Sheikh Khalifa bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Erdogan visited the Gulf country on May 17.
Erdogan also visited Azerbaijan at the invitation of his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev on the occasion of Republic Day on May 28. He also attended the first foreign edition of Teknofest, Turkey’s premier generation and aviation exhibition, as well as a series of openings, and held an assembly with Aliyev.
NATO Summit
To attend the June 28-30 NATO summit, Erdogan traveled to the Spanish capital, Madrid, where he participated in quadrilateral talks with Finnish President Sauli Niinisto, then-Swedish Prime Minister Magdelena Andersson and NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg.
In a summit consultation loyal to Ukraine, Erdogan met with US President Joe Biden, French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, Albanian Prime Minister Rama, Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer, Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte, Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez, Johnson, then British Prime Minister, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, Romanian President Klaus Werner Iohannis, NATO Stoltenberg and European Council President Charles Michel.
He also paid an official to Tehran, the Iranian capital, on July 18 and 19 at the invitation of Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi and attended the seventh assembly of the Turkey-Iran High-Level Cooperation Council.
Visits to Russia and Ukraine
Erdogan met with his Russian counterpart in Sochi on Aug. 5, followed on Aug. 18 via a one-day race to Ukraine, where he met his Ukrainian counterpart at the Potocki Palace in Lviv.
The following month he toured the Balkans, visiting Bosnia and Herzegovina on 6 September, Serbia on 7 September and Croatia on 7 September.
Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit
On September 15 and 16, Erdogan participated in the 22nd Summit of Heads of State of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization in the city of Samarkand in Uzbekistan at the invitation of his Uzbek counterpart. On the sidelines, Erdogan met with his counterparts from Azerbaijan, Russia and Iran, as well as Chinese President Xi Jinping, Mongolian President Ukhnaagiin Khurelsukh, Tajik President Imamali Rahman, Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko, Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif and Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
Following his visits to Uzbekistan, Erdogan left for the United States Sept. 17-22 to attend the 77th U. N. General Assembly.
At the event, Erdogan met with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, as well as Presidents Alejandro Giammattei of Guatemala, Alexander Van der Bellen of Austria, Andrzej Duda of Poland and Ersin Tatar of the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC).
Erdogan also met with the Chairman of the Presidential Council of Libya, Mohammad Younes Menfi, the Chairman of the Presidential Council of Yemen, Rashad Al-Alimi, and the King of Jordan, Abdullah II, at the event, while hosting the Prime Minister of Georgia Irakli Garibashvili, the Prime Minister of Israel Yair Lapid, the Chancellor of Germany, Scholz. , Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida, Lebanese Prime Minister Najib Mikati and then British Prime Minister Elizabeth Truss.
World Jewish Congress President Ronald Lauder and FIFA President Gianni Infantino were also visitors to the Turkish president in New York.
September also saw a progression similar to the Russian-Ukrainian war with the mediation of Türkiye.
In an interview with reporters at the Turkevi skyscraper in New York at the end of the U. S. UU. de Erdogan on September 22, announced a 200-prisoner exchange between Russia and Ukraine as a result of his diplomatic efforts with Putin and Zelensky.
Meeting of the European Political Community
On October 6, Erdogan traveled to the Czech Republic to attend an assembly of the European Political Community, before which he held talks with his Azerbaijani counterpart and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan. On the sidelines of the assembly, Erdogan met with French President Macron, Bulgarian President Rumen Radev, Spanish Prime Minister Sanchez, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban, Czech Prime Minister Petr Fiala and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
He then left on October 12 for the Kazakh capital, Astana, to attend the two-day Turkey-Kazakhstan High-Level Strategic Cooperation Council and the Conference on Cooperation, as well as the Conference on Interaction and Confidence-Building in Asia. He met with President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev of Kazakhstan, President Mirziyoyev of Uzbekistan, his Russian and Belarusian counterparts and Vietnamese Vice President Vo Thi Anh Xuan.
On Oct. 20, Erdogan made another stop in Azerbaijan to attend the rite of inauguration of Zangilan International Airport, Azerbaijan’s current airport in the territories that regained Armenia’s 2020 Karabakh war. Erdogan and Aliyev then attended the rite of inauguration of an agricultural village assignment. in Zangilán.
At his time in Samarkand this year, Erdogan attended the ninth summit of the Organization of Turkish States on Nov. 10-11, with Uzbek President Mirziyoyev handing over the “Turkish Supreme World Order. “On the sidelines of the summit, Erdogan also won Hungarian Prime Minister and former Turkmenistan President Gurbanguly Berdimuhamedov.
At the summit, the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) admitted the foreign organization as an observer member.
World Cup Ceremonies
On November 15-16, Erdogan visited the Indonesian island of Bali to attend the 17th G20 leaders’ summit and held bilateral talks with Indonesian President Joko Widodo, U. S. President Biden, French President Macron, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and German Chancellor Scholz.
With the G20 summit, Erdogan attended at least seven foreign summits abroad in 2022.
He also visited the opening rite of the 2022 FIFA World Cup in Doha, the capital of Qatar, on November 20, at the invitation of Sheikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, emir of the Gulf Arab nation.
On December 13 and 14, Erdogan traveled to Turkmenistan to attend a summit with his Azerbaijani counterpart Aliyev, as well as Berdimuhamedov, now president of his country’s legislative chamber, and his son and successor, President Serdar Berdimuhamedov.
On December 18, Erdogan attended the final rite of the 2022 FIFA World Cup with the leaders invited to Doha.
Foreign guests
President Erdogan has hosted many leaders in 2022, and his first guest of the year was Turkish Cypriot Prime Minister Faiz Sucuoglu on January 12.
Six days later, Erdogan hosted Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic and President Nayib Bukele of El Salvador on Jan. 20 at the presidential meeting in Ankara, the Turkish capital.
On February 1, Erdogan received Lebanese Prime Minister Mikati, followed a day later by the President of the Kurdish Regional Government of Iraq (KRG), Nechirvan Barzani.
After testing positive for COVID-19, Erdogan rested from February 5 to 10.
He returned to the fray on February 26, when he won over Iraqi parliament speaker Mohammed al-Halboosi and Khamis al-Khanjar, who heads the country’s largest Sunni bloc, the Alliance for Sovereignty. The director of the National Intelligence Organization of Türkiye, Hakan Fidan, also provided at the meeting.
On March 1, Erdogan hosted his Kosovar counterpart Vjosa Osmani-Sadriu at the presidential compound.
Historic for Israel after 14 years
The third month of the year also included a historic occasion in which Israeli President Isaac Herzog paid an official to Turkey on March 9, becoming the first Israeli leader to do so since 2008.
On March 10, Erdogan met with Azerbaijani Aliyev at a dinner hosted at the Cankaya presidential palace in Ankara, while discussing bilateral war and Russian-Ukrainian war.
Antalya Diplomatic Forum
The annual Antalya Diplomatic Forum, which was held in the southern Turkish Mediterranean resort, was held on March 11-12 in the presence of President Erdogan. The occasion brought together combined participants from 75 countries, adding 17 Heads of State and Government and 80 ministers.
During the forum, Erdogan won Albanian Prime Minister Rama, Bulgarian Prime Minister Kiril Petkov, NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg, KRG Chairman Barzani, Kazakhstan’s founding President Nursultan Nazarbayev, Slovenian President Borut Pahor and members of the Presidential Council of Bosnia and Herzegovina Sefik Dzaferovic and Milorad. Dodik.
Erdogan also met with his West African counterparts Umaro Sissoco Embalo of Guinea-Bissau, Mohamed Bazoum of Niger, Julius Maada Bio of Sierra Leone and George Manneh Weah of Liberia.
On March 13 he won Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis at the Vahdettin mansion in Istanbul and then received German Chancellor Scholz on March 14 in an official rite at the presidential complex.
Erdogan met Polish President Andrzej Duda two days later at the presidential palace in Cankaya.
On March 18, the Turkish president won over South Korean Prime Minister Kim Boo-kyum, who arrived in Turkey to attend the 1915 Canakkale Bridge inauguration rite in the northwest of the country.
Dutch Prime Minister Rutte arrived in Turkey for an official stopover on March 22, greeted through Erdogan at the presidential compound.
The president of Türkiye received only two visitors in April, one of them was KRG Prime Minister Masrour Barzani at the Dolmabahce presidency in Istanbul on April 15.
On April 25, he beat UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres at the presidential complex in Ankara.
He welcomed Kazakh President Tokayev in an official rite at the compound on May 10, followed by Emir Sheikh Al Thani of Qatar at Istanbul’s Vahdettin mansion 3 days later.
On May 14, he inaugurated Rize-Artvin Airport together with Azerbaijani President Aliyev.
On May 16, Erdogan received Algerian President Abdelmadjid Tebboune, who arrived in Turkey for an official visit, with an official rite at the presidential compound.
He also met with Colombian President Ivan Duque Marquez at the Dolmabahce presidency in Istanbul on May 20.
Turkey’s president beat TRNC’s Prime Minister Unal Ustel in the presidential election in early June.
That month, Erdogan hosted Pakistani Prime Minister Shahbaz Sharif, Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, North Macedonian Prime Minister Dimitar Kovacevski, Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman, and Austrian Parliament Speaker Wolfgang Sobotka.
In July, Erdogan beat Italian Prime Minister Draghi, President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, Malaysian Prime Minister Ismail Sabri Yakoob and Gagauz Autonomous Region President Irina Vlah.
On August 9, Erdogan and Aliyev met in Turkey’s central province of Konya for the opening rite of the V Islamic Solidarity Games. There, the Turkish president also met with Algerian Prime Minister Aymen Benabderrahmane and Palestinian Prime Minister Mohammad Shtayyeh on the sidelines of the event. .
Erdogan met with Slovenian President Pahor, who paid an official to Turkey on Aug. 10 and won Albanian Prime Minister Rama the same day.
On August 16, he welcomed Malaysia’s King Abdullah Ri’ayatuddin Al-Mustafa Billah Shah, who paid an official to Turkey with an official rite at the presidential compound.
President Erdogan met with Lithrougha High Council of State Chairman Khalid al-Mishri at the compound on August 17, followed by Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas on August 23.
He met with the President of the Republic of Congo, Denis Sassou N’Guesso, the Prime Minister of the Government of National Accord of Libya, Abdul Hamid al-Dbeibeh, the President of Kyrgyzstan, Sadyr Japarov, and the Tatar of the TRNC.
After hosting Albanian Prime Minister Rama on October 11, Erdogan met with Qatari Emir Al Thani on October 14 at the Dolmabahce office in Istanbul.
Erdogan beat Uzbek Vice President Sardor Umurzakov on Oct. 25 and then former Lebanese Prime Minister Saad Hariri on Oct. 28 at the presidential compound in Ankara.
President Erdogan beat NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg in Istanbul in Dolmabahce on November 4.
Swedish Prime Minister Ulf Kristersson was one of November’s most important visitors, as he arrived on November 8 with the Nordic country’s request for the NATO club on the agenda.
Cuban President Miguel Mario Diaz-Canel Bermudez paid an official to Turkey on Nov. 23, while Erdogan also won Pakistani Prime Minister Sharif on Nov. 25.
It was won by the Secretary General of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation, Hissein Brahim Taha, on November 28.
During the month of December, Erdogan hosted six guests, the Albanian prime minister, who arrived in Turkey to attend the TRT 2022 Global Forum on December 9. On the same day, Erdogan also beat Bulgarian President Rumen Radev.
On December 20, Erdogan beat the speaker of the Bulgarian parliament, Vezhdi Rashidov, followed the next day by Senegal’s President Macky Sall at the presidential compound.
When President Erdogan won over the chairman of Saudi Arabia’s Shura Council, Abdullah Mohammed Ibrahim Al-Sheikh, in the presidential compound on December 26, 4 days before Montenegrin President Milo Djukanovic Erdogan’s last guest of the year on December 30.
As part of his intense diplomatic efforts, President Erdogan participated in nearly two hundred phone calls with world leaders, adding U. S. President Biden, Russian President Putin, Ukrainian President Zelenskyy, French President Macron, and British King Carlos III.
Because of the ongoing war in Ukraine, the leaders with whom Erdogan had the most phone conversations were Zelenskyy and Putin 16 times each. These talks saw negotiations over the grain corridor, prisoner exchanges, and the end of the war continuing into its 11th. month.
*Written through Merve Aydogan