Ankara- On Wednesday, Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan arrived in the French capital, Paris, during an official visit to be considered a new station on the Turkish relations path which have experienced tensions in recent years.
The visit comes in the context of mutual efforts to calm differences and restore the momentum of diplomatic communication between Ankara and Paris, after a series of measures that reflected the desire of both parties to improve relations recently.
Fidan met his French counterpart, Minister of State for European and Foreign Affairs, Jean -Nawil Barrow, with prior expectations that their talks would include the strengthening of bilateral relations and the discussion of urgent regional and international developments.
The Anatolia news agency cited sources from the Turkish Foreign Ministry, earlier, that talks will understand:
Although Turkish diplomatic sources have told Anatolia that the meeting had left for an official Visit of Fidan in France, the sources did not mention other details on the content of the visit.
However, Turkish sources have anticipated the visit by stressing that the talks deal with means of improving economic cooperation between Ankara and Paris, in particular in the fields of trade, investment, energy and tourism, after the volume of trade between the two countries reaching around $ 22.5 billion in 2024.
Regional files
According to the Turkish Foreign Affairs Ministry, the Syrian file goes beyond the Calendar of Fidan talks in Paris, in the light of a clear variation in the priorities of Ankara and Paris on the future of Syria after the fall of the Assad regime; While Türkiye confirms his support for new Syrian leaders, he underlines the need to dismantle the Kurdish people’s protection units in the north of the country and to integrate opposition into state institutions, as well as lifting the sanctions imposed on the new damas.
On the other hand, France welcomes political change in Syria, but it retains its reservations about Ankara’s approach in terms of security in the North, and insists to form a complete government which guarantees the representation of all Syrian spectra.
This comes in the wake of a limited diplomatic escalation between the two parties, after the Turkish Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan excluded, at the beginning of this year, any role for the French forces in Syria, and considered that the United States is the only axis in his country there. He also accused Paris of ignored Turkish security problems and called him to restore his fighters imprisoned in Syria and try them in France.
On Ukrainian affairs, the sources expected the Turkish Minister to renew his country’s assertion of “preparing to contribute to the creation of a permanent and fair peace between Russia and Ukraine,” emphasizing “the need for all the allies to cooperate closely in the process leading to peace”, according to its previous declarations in this regard.
In Gaza, the visit raises a file which is no less important, because Ankara has led political and humanitarian efforts since the start of the war and accuses Israel of crimes against civilians. While France calls for a permanent cease-fire and the delivery of aid, with its warning against any violation of international law, without imposing sanctions.
Launching problems
Far from the regional files, the bilateral problems which have stuck in the Table of Fidan Visit, led by the educational file, which in recent years have been assisted by a chronic point of tension in the Ankara and Paris relations.
The disagreements are still on the status of French schools in Turkey, and Ankara has in recent years organizing the status of French schools such as schools “Charles de Gaulle” in Ankara and “Pierre Lotty” in Istanbul, thanks to bilateral agreements which give them legal status within Turkey, where the Turkish side In these schools without the supervision of education.
On the other hand, Turkey has been looking for for years to obtain official approval which allows it to open Turkish schools or at least to provide systematic education to the Turkish community in France, but these requests have been satisfied with French conservation, in particular in light of the sensitivities associated with the integration and cultural sovereignty file inside France.
This file attended a remarkable development last August, when the two parties reached an initial understanding which ruled a temporary suspension of the acceptance of new Turkish students in French schools within Turkey, pending a complete legal agreement, while maintaining current students under the joint supervision of Turkish teachers, and it is expected that it will be strongly represented during the Visit of Fidan, to reach a forest that satisfies both parties.
According to Turkish sources, defensive relations emerge as a sensitive file between Ankara and Paris. During the maximum tension between the two countries, France has imposed restrictions on exports of technologies and defense equipment in Turkey in the context of a European collective position as a result of Ankara military operations in Syria in 2019. Turkey is now seeking to improve cooperation in the defense industries with France and eliminate restrictions on the export of arms and military equipment.
Fidan is expected to focus on his talks on the need to increase these defensive restrictions and to encourage joint projects in the field of military industries, especially since the two countries are members of NATO and share regional security alliances.
In addition, the Turkish team renews its request for a more assertive decision against organizations classified by Ankara and is active in France, in particular with regard to the Kurdistan workers’ party, which accuses Turkey Paris to turn their eyes to its activities under the cover of the Islamic State.
It should be noted that Fidan’s visit to Paris crown a series of communications and rapprochement that have taken place in recent months between Turkish and French leaders after a period of distance. The most important thing was the meeting of Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan with his French counterpart, Emmanuel Macron, confronted last November, on the sidelines of the summit of the European political group organized in the Hungarian capital Budapest.
Disagreement management
Political analyst Murad Toural said that the visit of the Minister of Foreign Affairs Hakan Fidan in Paris represents an “important step to break the dead end” in Turkish relations – French, but it comes – according to its expression – in the context of “cooling the crisis more than a strategic change”.
He explained in an interview with Al -jazeera Net, that Ankara manages his relations with Paris currently with the logic of “dispute” and not his escalation, taking advantage of the European need for security and diplomatic coordination in the light of regional and international challenges, but he stressed that “the lack of accumulated confidence does not reach a single visit.”
Torral believes that exceptional bilateral files, such as the situation of French schools in Türkiye, defense cooperation and progress in relations with the European Union, represents a real test of any rapprochement. He stressed that the dissolution of the school file constitutes an “important indication of the will of the two parties to make mutual concessions”, while the defense file remains the “most sensitive”, stressing that the lifting of French restrictions on arms exports to Turkey will be a “panel of strategic trust” if it is reached.
At the end of her speech, Toural called to reduce the ceiling of the expectations of the visit, stressing that his success is not measured by joint data as much as it is measured by “continuing communication after her and the activation of joint action channels”. He considered that the current atmosphere offers the opportunity to “strengthen confidence step by step”, but he warned against a possible setback if the positive intentions are not translated into tangible stages.
For his part, the international business researcher, Ahmed Ozgour, considered that Fidan’s visit to Paris shows a Turkish desire to diversify the influence channels in Europe after Ankara has focused on Berlin and Brussels in recent years.
He added in an interview with Al -jazeera Net, that Turkey is aware of the importance of France as an independent actor within the European Union, in particular after the climbing of the security role of Paris in the eastern Mediterranean and Africa, noting that Ankara seeks to build tactical and not long -term understanding.
Ozgour has considered that the Syrian file will remain a point of collision between the two countries, but it is likely that Türkiye will benefit from the opening of France to the new Syrian leadership, to push Europeans to examine the sanctions.