Russian President Vladimir Putin and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan (Reuters)

Turkey was expecting Russian President Vladimir Putin to make his expected visit to Turkey on February 12, but Turkish officials recently informed the Russian "TASS" agency that the visit was postponed to another date.

Because the other previous dates that Ankara set for the visit were similar to the fate of the February 12 date, repeated postponements have become commonplace in the scene surrounding the visit, but it raises a discussion about the problem of the date as much as it parallels the visit itself.

Last April, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan expected that Putin would visit Turkey to participate in the opening ceremony of the Akkuyu nuclear plant at the end of the same month, but the latter participated in the ceremony via video.

At the beginning of this February, Russian media reported that Turkish banks began closing accounts of Russian companies after the United States imposed additional sanctions on foreign banks that Washington claims are involved in Russian military industrial supply transactions.

Last August, Erdogan again expected the visit to take place in the same month, but it did not take place either. Never before in the history of Turkish-Russian relations, since they began to grow closely in recent years, has the ambiguity over setting the date for the two presidents’ visits to each other lasted this long.

First of all, there are two incomprehensible problems regarding the timing of the visit: The first: Turkey was always the first to set the dates without any Russian confirmation of them. The second: Russia did not deny every time Putin's intention to visit, and was constantly talking about the issues that would be addressed without specifying the date. These two problems are difficult to explain clearly in relations between two countries that have been witnessing strong momentum for years.

While the failure of the visit to take place last April can be attributed at the time to Putin’s heeding of the results of the Turkish presidential elections that took place last May. To know whether Erdogan will remain in power, but the failure to hold it also on the second date after the elections, which is last August, and also on the last date on February 12, raises questions about whether there are differences between the two countries that prevent an agreement on... Appointment to visit.

What strengthened the legitimacy of these questions is that in the last canceled date for the visit, it was not only set by Ankara, but also indicated by Putin when he spoke in his annual press conference on the occasion of the end of last year that he would visit Turkey at the beginning of the new year. It was understood from his speech at the time that the visit would take place in the first month of the new year, or the second month at the latest.

Although Ankara and Moscow have not explicitly revealed the existence of any potential differences that prevent them from agreeing on a date for the visit, listing some notable developments in Turkish-Russian relations since the first date Erdogan set for the visit may help explain the ambiguity regarding its date.

About a month before the second canceled date last August, Turkey's permission for five Ukrainian Azov leaders to return to their country accompanied by Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, who visited Turkey last July, sparked a protest from Moscow, which accused Ankara of not adhering to the agreement that allowed the departure of... The Azov leaders transferred the Ukrainian territories to Turkey and remained there until the end of the war.

At the beginning of this February, Russian media reported that Turkish banks began closing accounts of Russian companies after the United States imposed additional sanctions on foreign banks that Washington claims are involved in Russian military industrial supply transactions. Although Türkiye did not explicitly confirm these reports, a Kremlin spokesman said: Moscow is discussing with Ankara to address this issue.

Last January, Turkey signed a memorandum with Romania and Bulgaria to cooperate in the field of combating sea mines in the Black Sea region. This is a step that, although Moscow did not comment on, falls within the framework of Turkey’s efforts to cooperate more closely with the countries overlooking the Black Sea basin. , which views Russian policies in the Black Sea as threatening the geopolitical balance in this region. Also in January, Turkey ratified Sweden's membership in NATO.

The continuation of Turkish-Russian relations in the era after the Russian war on Ukraine, and the growth of trade between the two countries since that period, did not, of course, hide the fact that this stability faces additional challenges. Because of Ankara's close relationship with Ukraine and its expression of support for Kiev's accession to NATO, Turkey's increasing cooperation with other Black Sea basin countries, and Turkey's attempt to improve its relations with the West.

It is still unclear whether the possible new date for completing the visit, which is the end of next April or the beginning of next May, will put an end to this ambiguity surrounding the visit, but what is certain is that the conditions for conducting the visit have not yet fully matured, and that these circumstances are not related to By choosing the appropriate date, as much as it is related to providing an appropriate environment in Turkish-Russian relations that helps in completing them.

Agreeing on the date of the visit has become as important as, and perhaps more important than, the visit itself. What can be concluded from the ongoing Turkish push to set repeated dates for the visit, and from the continued Russian assertion that the visit will take place, is that the two countries aim for the expected visit to constitute a new turning point in the course of Turkish-Russian relations.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the editorial position of Al Jazeera.