Minsk

Turkey and Belarus have set a trade target at $1 billion following a 10-fold growth in 14 years. 

More than 450 businesspeople participated in the Belarus-Turkey Business Forum held by DEİK and the Belarus Chamber of Trade and Industry as part of President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's official visit to the capital city of Minsk on Nov. 11. 

In President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan's narrative, Turkey is a fairy tale. In reality the Crescent and Star is stranger than fiction. It is a collection of unpleasant chronicles unless the reader is one of Mr. Erdoğan's willing soldiers. It is a successful thriller if shown to a liberal audience. 

Turkish President Recep Erdogan, who is visiting Belarus, attributed great significance to the opening of a mosque in the capital Minsk.

According to Erdogan, this is happening at a moment when there is growing islamophobia and discrimination of various religions in Europe.

Turkey would like to boost economic ties with Belarus and increase the mutual trade volume to $1 billion, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan said during a visit to Minsk on Nov. 11.      

Russian President Vladimir Putin supports the deployment of armed OSCE observers in eastern Ukraine, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has said.

Putin was in Berlin on Wednesday where he spoke about the implementation of the 2015 Minsk peace agreement with French, German, and Ukrainian leaders.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel said "no miracles" were achieved on the Ukraine crisis on Oct. 20, but talks with the country's leader and his Russian and French counterparts did lead to some progress on ending a deadlock in the peace process.

Russia disregarded international law and Bulgaria will not support an end to sanctions imposed by the EU, Foreign Minister Daniel Mitov has said.

Mitov has told Reuters in an interview that Russia's actions with regard to the Ukraine crisis "can't be left without consequences and the only peaceful instrument is sanctions."

The normalization of the relations between Turkey and Russia would help solve the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu said on July 15.

NATO will hold its first formal talks with Russia in nearly two years on April 20 to discuss the Ukraine crisis and other security issues, the U.S.-led military alliance said on April 12.
 
"The date has been mutually agreed," a NATO spokeswoman told AFP, adding: "It is good to talk but it cannot be a return to business as usual."

The NATO-Russia Council will meet in the next two weeks for the first time since 2014 to duscuss the Ukraine crisis.

"Following consultations with Russia, we have agreed to hold a meeting of the NATO-Russia Council at Ambassadorial level," NATO Secretary General, Jens Stoltenberg, said in a statement on Friday.