Turkish FM to attend Munich conference, meet counterparts

ANKARA

Foreign Minister Hakan Fidan will attend the Munich Security Conference this weekend as the annual gathering will focus on the growing divide between the United States and Europe over NATO burden sharing and the Ukraine peace process.

A written statement by the Foreign Ministry informed that Fidan will be in Germany to attend the two-day conference between Feb. 14 and 16.

According to the MSC agenda, Fidan will take part on Feb. 15 in a special session on Syria under the title of “New Dawn for Damascus: Prospects for Syria’s Transition,” along with Syria’s Foreign Minister Hasan Al-Shaibani, Saudi Arabia’s Foreign Minister Prince Faisal bin Farhan Al-Saud as well as the U.N. special envoy to Syria Geir Pedersen.

The Turkish foreign minister is also expected to hold bilateral meetings with a number of foreign ministers and other senior officials over global and regional developments.

According to the diplomatic sources, Fidan was scheduled to meet British Foreign Secretary David Lammy, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock, U.S. Secretary of State Marco Rubio, Romanian Foreign Minister Emil Hurezanu, French Foreign Minister Jean-Noël Barrot and Finnish Foreign Minister Elina Valtonen. The Fidan-Rubio meetings are the first high-level exchange between Türkiye and the U.S. since U.S. President Donald Trump took office in January.

In the meantime, Fidan exchanged a phone conversation with Egyptian Foreign Minister Badr Abdelatty on Feb. 14, sources stated. The two ministers discussed the recent developments in Gaza amid a difficult and fragile truce between Israel and Hamas.