ISTANBUL: Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) President Ersin Tatar met with his Azerbaijani counterpart Ilham Aliyev.
The meeting took place as Tatar visited Azerbaijan to take part in a two-day informal summit of heads of state of the Organization of Turkic States (OTS) in the city of Shusha in Azerbaijan’s recently liberated Karabakh region.
Both leaders acknowledged the importance of the summit and discussed topics such as transportation, bilateral relations, and climate change, according to a statement from the Azerbaijan Presidency.
Tatar expressed gratitude to Aliyev for the invitation, highlighting the summit’s role in strengthening cooperation among Turkic states and in showcasing the TRNC globally.
The TRNC holds observer status in the Organization of Turkic States, an intergovernmental body formed in 2009 to foster collaboration among Turkic nations.
Azerbaijan regained control of most of the Armenian-occupied Karabakh region during a 44-day war in the fall 2020, which concluded with a Russian-brokered peace deal that paved the way for normalization and border delineation.
Last September, Azerbaijan established complete sovereignty over Karabakh when separatist forces in the region surrendered.
