Thomas de Waal: Russia and Turkey have good reasons for rapprochement

Baku. 31 August. REPORT.AZ/ "Russia and Turkey have good reasons for rapprochement after six months of icy relations."

Report informs, the expert on South Caucasus Thomas de Waal writes in his article published by the Carnegie Europe.

According to him, the presidents of Russia and Turkey Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is trying to improve relations, thus want to express their dissatisfaction with the West.

According to him, a lot of players, including Azerbaijan and the Turkic states of Central Asia, did not seek to take sides in the dispute after the downed Turkish Russian Su-24. The analyst believes that the cooling of relations between Moscow and Ankara have been hit hard by the Turkish economy due to the prohibition of supply of Turkish goods to Russia, and the fall of the number of Russian tourists in Turkey, on the other hand blow to Russia's intention to reduce its dependence on gas supplies through Ukraine in the framework of the project Turkish stream under the Black sea.

According to the expert, Russian and Turks tend to think that Europe is not fair in relation to these two great countries on its flanks, which, as they see it, blocking the rest of the continent on a variety of troubles from the East and South.

Speaking of co-ordination in the Syrian issue, Thomas de Waal pointed out that both countries have made a strategic deal to co-operation against "Islamic state" in the north, but but the parties still support the opposing sides in the battle for Aleppo.

"Therefore, a reconciliation of Erdoğan and Putin is more like a business deal with the limited goals and economic rationale rather than a strategic alliance", says the article.

According to the expert, leaders of both countries see a world in which alliances like NATO or transnational organizations like the EU are weaker and mean less: "The two leaders are more comfortable with a world in which alliances are transient and transactional", the article states.