TURKEY AIMS TO TURN BLACK SEA REGION INTO FREE TRADE ZONE

ArmInfo
2007-06-28 16:06:00

Turkish State Minister Kursad Tuzmen said on Wednesday that Turkey was
determined to turn the Black Sea region into a free trade zone in the
next five years. In an interview with the semi-official Anatolia news
agency, Tuzmen said that within this framework, Turkey was about to
sign a free trade agreement with Georgia and had launched initiatives
to sign another one with Russia.

All member states of the Black Sea Economic Cooperation (BSEC) support
the idea of making the Black Sea region a free trade zone, and this
would make a positive contribution to economies of these countries,
he said.

"Turkish and Ukrainian technical delegations will launch initial
negotiations on Friday regarding an agreement. And we have also
agreed with Azerbaijan and Moldova to open talks on a preferential
trade agreement," Tuzmen said.

Turkey’s current trade volume with the BSEC countries stood at 38
billion U.S. dollars, said Tuzmen, adding that it could climb to 60
billion U.S. dollars in three years.

In addition, Turkish contractors have won projects worth at 28
billion U.S. dollars among BSEC countries so far, and Turkish
investments in these countries have exceeded seven billion dollars,
Tuzmen added. "We also want to turn the Caspian Sea into a free trade
zone. We will realize our ‘three seas’ project when we fulfill all
these initiatives. The Mediterranean Sea has already become a free
trade zone," said the minister. The BSEC is comprised of Bulgaria,
Georgia, Romania, Russia, Turkey, Ukraine, Albania, Armenia,
Azerbaijan, Greece, Moldova and Serbia.

As RA FM’s spokesman Vladimir Karapetyan told ArmInfo, "this initiative
was not discussed at BSEC summit in Istanbul". Having doubted existence
of the initiative in the version, by which it is represented by
Turkey’s State Minister, he added that the matter possibly concerns
signing of bilateral agreement on cooperation among the countries of
BSEC region.

To note, no progress was achieved in normalization of the
Armenian-Turkish relations during negotiations between the Armenian
and Turkish Foreign Ministers within the frames of BSEC which have
been recently completed in Istanbul. In particular, in response to
RA FM Vardan Oskanyan’s appeal to open Armenia-Turkey border, A. Gul
again spoke of the Karabakh conflict settlement necessity.