"ABOUT 90 PERCENT OF TURKISH COMMODITIES ARE EXPORTED TO THE POST-SOVIET STATES, WHEREAS TURKEY’S MAIN PARTNER IN THE CONSTRUCTION FIELD IS RUSSIA"
Regnum, Russia
June 27 2007
Moscow, 27 June 2006 – Almost all the region of the South Caucasus,
including the Nagorno Karabakh conflict zone, is Turkey’s sphere of
interests, which is discussed at all bilateral meetings, political
scientist, turkologist Viktor Nadein-Rayevskiy commented to REGNUM on
the proposed visit to Russia of Turkish President Ahmet Necdet Sezer
at a news briefing at the Caucasus Institute for Democracy. The visit
is planned for June 28-30.
Nadein-Rayevskiy said that the coming meeting of the two presidents
is hardly related to Turkeys’s striving to access the EU. "Russia
has her own relations with the EU and her own relations with Turkey.
Russia is a country that maintains partnership with all the EU member
countries but does not envision accessing the union in the foreseeable
future. This is not one of Russia’s objectives."
Russian-Turkish relations at their current stage of development
Nadein-Rayevskiy evaluated as "normal, friendly, including closest
economic cooperation." "Our relations are a complex thing. About
90 percent of Turkish commodities are exported to the post-Soviet
states, whereas Turkey’s main partner in the construction field is
Russia. However, shuttle trade that used to make up from $3bn to
$10bn a year of commodity circulation is not any more so flourishing.
But this form of trade is becoming obsolete. Russian consumers demand
other quality now." The expert added that the economic cooperation
between the two countries has not faded away because Turkey started
to keep an eye on the quality of her exported goods.