Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko has said that Ukraine is interested in increasing Turkey’s representation in the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine (OSCE SMM) and counts on Turkey’s support for the deployment of a UN peacekeeping mission to Donbas, the official website of the Ukrainian president has reported.
“We would be very interested in increasing the representation of Turkey in the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission. We thank you for the very clear and well-organized work of the Special Monitoring Mission, led by the representative of Turkey,” Poroshenko said, opening the sixth meeting of the High-level Strategic Council between Ukraine and Turkey together with President of Turkey Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Oct.9.
“Also in the near future, it will be of special importance for us to have the support of our partners, in particular, Turkey, in deployment of the UN peacekeeping mission in certain areas of Donetsk and Luhansk regions,” the Ukrainian president said, noting that the issue was on the agenda of his talks with Erdogan on Oct.9.
“The three hours we’ve spent on a tête-à-tête meeting with Mr. President give me every reason for optimism about the development of all areas of our bilateral cooperation and multilateral coordination,” Poroshenko said.
He noted the high dynamics of political dialogue between Ukraine and Turkey and the expansion of contacts in the past year, “including in such sensitive areas as defense, national security, law enforcement.” “We are satisfied with cooperation in the defense industry, aircraft building, and aerospace,” the Ukrainian president said.
Poroshenko also thanked the Turkish partners for their position on preventing human rights violations in the occupied Crimea and support for the Crimean Tatar people.
