ANKARA — Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan held separate phone calls with Ukrainian and Russian counterparts on Wednesday, offering to set up a joint mechanism to investigate a Ukrainian dam collapse.
The Nova Kakhovka dam, one of the largest in the country, lies on the Dnipro River in Russian-occupied southern Ukraine. It collapsed on Tuesday, prompting tens of thousands to flee the region.
In his phone calls first with Ukrainian President Volodymir Zelenskyy and then with Russian President Vladimir Putin on Wednesday, Erdogan tabled a proposal to set up a mechanism involving Russian and Ukrainian experts, the United Nations and Turkey, according to official Turkish readouts. Erdogan pointed to the joint mechanism known as the Black Sea grain deal initiative for the proposal. Turkey and the United Nations brokered the Black Sea deal between Kyiv and Moscow last year, allowing Ukrainian grain and other products to reach world markets. Ankara also hosted a series of meetings between Ukrainian and Russian human rights commissioners to strike a prisoner swap meeting between the two countries.
Zelenskyy, in turn, said he reiterated his country's urgent needs to avoid a disaster after the dam's destruction. "[Turkey's] voice is important when it comes to the withdrawal of occupation troops from Ukrainian territory. It is also important when it comes to the return of our illegally detained citizens, in particular Crimean Tatars," he tweeted.
