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Montreux Convention remains in force amid Ukraine tensions — Turkish defense ministry

Turkey will continue dialogue with Russia and Ukraine and will fulfill NATO obligations, Hulusi Akar also pointed out

KIEV, January 31. /TASS/. Turkey’s Defense Minister Hulusi Akar on Monday said his country will fully comply with the Montreux Convention regarding the regime of the straits as tensions around Ukraine are mounting.

Ankara will also continue to reach out to Moscow and Kiev in a bid to help their relations to come back to normal, he said.

The regime of the straits, which the convention established to regulate the transit of warships, "benefits all sides," the minister said on TRT television. "Abandoning the convention isn’t under discussion," he said.

"Regarding a Black Sea dialogue, Turkey does all it should," Akar said. "We will continue our dialogue with Russia and Ukraine and will fulfill our NATO obligations."

The Montreux Convention regulates navigation in the Bosporus and Dardanelles Straits and lays out the rules for time and tonnage regarding the transit and presence of warships not belonging to Black Sea states.

Akar said tensions between Russia and Ukraine "posed the danger of uncontrolled escalation." He advised all sides to stay calm and continue the efforts to maintain dialogue.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on January 26 said that he had invited Russian leader Vladimir Putin to visit Turkey. He expressed a desire to arrange a face-to-face meeting between Putin and Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky so that they could "continue to move towards restoring an atmosphere of peace".

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on January 24 said the Kremlin had no specific data about the possibility of a meeting between Putin and his Turkish counterpart. During phone talks in December 2021, Putin told Erdogan Ukraine pursued a destructive policy aimed at undermining the Minsk agreements.

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