Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has pledged to complete a gas distribution hub to pipe Russian natural gas into Europe via Türkiye. Erdogan said that the project, first suggested by Russian President Vladimir Putin, will be built with Russian assistance.
“We will strengthen Türkiye’s position as an international hub even further,” Erdogan said in a speech on Monday. “Actually, Mr. Putin mentioned again the creation of the hub in the region of Thrace in Türkiye in his congratulatory message. We will do that together with them. There will be a hub in Thrace.”
Erdogan won a third term in office on Sunday, defeating rival Kemal Kilicdaroglu in a runoff election. In a congratulatory message to Erdogan, Putin praised the Turkish president’s “personal contribution to the strengthening of friendly Russian-Turkish relations,” and hailed the construction of Türkiye’s first nuclear power plant and the creation of the gas hub as two significant joint projects.