Turkish foreign policymakers have ambitions for the country to play a role of regional leader from the Balkans and the Black Sea to the Middle East and Africa.
This is what a speech by the country’s Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoglu at the Turkish Foreign and Humanitarian’s Business and Humanitarian Policy Conference and publicized recently by state-run Anadolu Agency’s website has indicated.
He specifically said: “Sixty per cent of global crises and conflicts occur in our geographical area and concern us directly. Despite all the difficulties, thanks to what these difficulties have taught us, Turkey has become a country with increased regional power.”
Cavusoglu also said that foreign policy is a national one and goes beyond domestic policy. And that it works in the interests of the nation and the state.
Turkey is among three main continents, he also said before adding: “We are a country of the Black Sea, the Balkans, the Middle East and the Mediterranean Sea.
“We are in the center of an area that extends from one side to the Caucasus and to Africa from the other. And the fact that we are in the center of such an area demands that we are strong.”
