Verkhovna Rada Committee on Foreign Affairs holds working meeting with delegation of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey

Information Department
09 December 2015, 13:48




The participants in the meeting held on December 8, 2015 were Chairperson of the Committee Hanna Hopko, First Deputy Chairperson of the Committee Ivanna Klympush-Tsyntsadze, Deputy Chairperson/Head of the parliamentary group on interparliamentary relations with Turkey, Borys Tarasiuk; Chairperson of the Subcommittee on Euro-Atlantic Cooperation and European Integration of the Committee on Foreign Affairs Svitlana Zalishchuk; MPs Mariya Ionova, Andrii Teteruk, Ivan Vinnyk. From the foreign side, the meeting was attended by representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Turkey Shefik Vural Altay, Cigdem Shaylyman, and Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary of Turkey to Ukraine Yonet Gian Tezel.

The Ukrainian side expressed the need for further intensification of inter-parliamentary cooperation between the two countries at political, economic and humanitarian levels, thanked the Turkish side for its support of the territorial integrity and sovereignty of Ukraine, and expressed hope for more active support of Ukraine by the Turkish parliamentary circles, in particular, in the issue of condemning the aggression of Russia against our state.

In addition, people's deputies familiarized the Turkish side with the state and prospects of implementation of internal reforms in our country; at that the particular attention was paid to the elaboration and adoption of a set of draft laws allowing our country to move confidently towards the European integration. The parties also discussed cooperation in the energy sector, security in the Black Sea region and issues of economic development of the said countries.

Representatives of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey informed the meeting participants about the domestic political situation in the country after the early elections to the Grand National Assembly (the Parliament) of Turkey, as well as about the events that occurred in November this year. In this regard, they noted that the country acted in full compliance with the international law touching the defense of own territorial integrity.
Special attention was paid to the annexation of Crimea and infringement of Crimean Tatars' rights. Representatives of the Turkish delegation stressed Turkey's strong concern over the situation faced by the Crimean Tatars in Crimea, and over the abuse of their fundamental rights. They stressed that the Turkish leadership permanently emphasizes on the inadmissibility of violation of these rights. It was accentuated that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey has repeatedly made statements condemning the oppression of the Crimean Tatars by the self-proclaimed government of the peninsula.