Turkey’s foreign minister on Thursday urged Russia and Ukraine to exercise restraint in the Black Sea, saying Ankara did not want the war to spread further in the strategic waterway.
Ukraine and Russia have repeatedly attacked each other’s ships in the Black Sea, a key export route for both countries, since Russia launched its full-scale invasion in February 2022.
“We do not want the war to spread to the Black Sea,” Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan said at a news conference in Kyiv alongside his Ukrainian counterpart, Andrii Sybiha.
“There is simply no explanation for a war in Europe to continue for five years in the 21st century. We need peace more than ever,” he added.
Turkey hosted talks between Ukraine and Russia at the start of the war and again in 2025.
The later rounds produced agreements on large-scale prisoner exchanges but no progress toward ending the fighting.
Fidan, who met with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow last month, said Turkey was ready to host further negotiations.
Sybiha said Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky was ready to meet with Putin in Turkey.
The Russian president has repeatedly rejected a meeting with Zelensky before the terms of a peace agreement are settled.
US-led diplomatic efforts have stalled, with Moscow and Kyiv remaining far apart over the terms of any settlement.
© Agence France-Presse