ANTALYA
Turkey’s president lashed out at the West on Friday, claiming that a harsher response to Russia’s 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula could have avoided Moscow’s current war on Ukraine.
“Would we be facing today’s image if the entire West had raised a clamor against the invasion of Crimea in 2014?” Recep Tayyip Erdogan asked during the opening ceremony of the three-day Antalya Diplomacy Forum in southern Turkey.
Russia annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014, an action condemned by the international world, including Turkey and the United Nations General Assembly.
As the Russia-Ukraine war enters its 16th day, Turkey’s president claims that Ukraine has been abandoned in its just cause.
“We hope that common sense and moderation will prevail.”