Ukrainian President V. Zelensky will travel to Turkey this week in an effort to start negotiations with Russia aimed at ending the war. US special envoy Steve Witkoff is expected to join Zelensky in Turkey, though the Kremlin has announced that Russia will not send a representative according to the Associated Press.
Turkey previously hosted low-level talks between Ukraine and Russia earlier this year, but the only notable progress reached in Istanbul concerned prisoner-of-war exchanges. International peace initiatives led by the United States have also failed to produce a breakthrough.
I don’t want to focus here on Ukraine’s fate, but rather on Turkey’s growing role in this process. Turkey is one of the few countries in the world that maintains normal relations with both Moscow and Kyiv, and this allows it to act as a mediator between the two countries.
If Turkey succeeds, it will become an unrivaled geopolitical super player, with influence stretching across Central Asia, the Middle East, Europe, and the South Caucasus. Notably, this is happening at a time when the influence of both Russia and Iran is diminishing, especially against the backdrop of the launch of the Trump route project.
Although that project is primarily economic rather than strategic or military by its nature, over time it could provide the United States with a strategic presence in the South Caucasus region and even beyond. For this reason, Turkey is one of the main beneficiaries of the new route and has long-term economic and logistic plans targeting not only the South Caucasus but also other regions such as the Black Sea region and financially Central Asia. Less then a year ago, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan pushed for stronger ties with ex-Soviet Turkic states at a summit in Central Asia. Erdoğan was attending a meeting in Bishkek of the Organization of Turkic States, a Turkish-led initiative to promote its culture and economic ties with former Soviet republics in Central Asia and the South Caucasus region.
If we consider that Turkey currently cannot be effectively counterbalanced by its main rivals, Russia and Iran, not only in Central Asia but also in the South Caucasus, it becomes clear that Turkey has a good opportunity to increase its influence.
