Istanbul -

Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry arrived in Turkey today, Monday, and met with his Turkish counterpart, Mevlut Cavusoglu, in a step that is the first of its kind in 10 years, to show solidarity with Turkey following the devastating earthquake that struck the south of the country on February 6.

The qualitative visit of the Egyptian official is not the only one.

Within the framework of broad international solidarity with Turkey against the background of the destruction and victims left by the earthquake wave, Ankara received many foreign ministers and high-level diplomats from around the world, and the country witnessed contacts that are the first of its kind with countries that were not in agreement with it.

The Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced that Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu held 23 face-to-face meetings and more than 70 phone calls with high-ranking officials who visited Turkey and called to express their solidarity with it.

The list of visitors and callers included the foreign ministers of Greece, Armenia, Egypt, Germany, Sweden, Israel and the United States.

These are countries whose bilateral relations with Turkey were not devoid of troubles and disagreements, although some of them have relations of alliance and friendship with them.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu (right) received his Egyptian counterpart, Sameh Shoukry, on a visit, the first in more than 10 years (Anatolia)

warmth in international relations

The Turkish foreign minister received his Egyptian counterpart in the southern city of Adana, one of the states affected by the earthquake.

Shoukry noted that the support provided by his country to Turkey in facing the ordeal of the earthquake is evidence of the depth of the relationship between the two peoples.

Shukri's visit is considered a new leap in the process of normalization that was taking place between Ankara and Cairo, and it came after a short visit to Damascus, during which he met with the Syrian Foreign Minister Faisal al-Miqdad, which in turn is an unprecedented visit by an Egyptian official of this level to Syria since the outbreak of the Syrian revolution in 2011.

On February 19, US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken also visited Turkey, and during his meeting with his Turkish counterpart, he confirmed President Joe Biden's administration's support for selling F-16 aircraft to Ankara, which is one of the outstanding issues between the two sides.

For his part, Cavusoglu stressed the need for the United States to end its support for the so-called "Kurdish People's Protection Units" in Syria.

In terms of the most sensitive issue, which is the accession of Sweden and Finland to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the NATO Secretary General announced that he had agreed to hold a tripartite meeting to discuss this issue, after he had previously announced during his solidarity visit to Turkey that there was progress in this regard.

On Monday, Cavusoglu announced that the third meeting on Finland and Sweden's accession to NATO will be held on March 9.


Would you be a substitute?

Mehmet Çelik, editor-in-chief of the English-language Turkish newspaper Daily Sabah, says that the "humanitarian approach" of the international community in dealing with the catastrophe of the devastating earthquake in Turkey has opened the door to easing tension and establishing common ground where dialogue and negotiations can begin on contentious issues.

However, he warned, in his interview with Al-Jazeera Net, that post-earthquake diplomacy cannot be a substitute for resolving controversial issues, because it is not sufficient to cover the differences, let alone overcome them.

And he considered that the earthquake "removed politics to a second place in the relations of states" as an expected result of any natural disaster in which tens of thousands die, pointing out that once its impact is gone, political differences will return to their usual place, as they will be placed again on the table and discussed in a different atmosphere.

Greek Foreign Minister Nikos Dendias' solidarity visit to Turkey opened the door to the possibility of resolving the differences between the two countries (French)

Greece and return to diplomacy

In conjunction with his foreign minister's visit of solidarity to Turkey, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis wrote on Twitter, "The Greeks and Turks are fighting side by side to save lives. We are grateful to everyone for what they have done."

For his part, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said during his meeting with his Greek counterpart, "We will normalize our relations with Greece, despite the divergence of views between the two countries."

The head of the Ankara Center for Policy and Crisis Research, Muhammad Saifuddin Erol, believes that the developments that took place between Turkey and Greece within the framework of "disaster diplomacy" indicate a "return to diplomatic mechanisms", although it is not the first time that two countries have supported each other in times of disaster.

He reminded Erol that Turkey had sent - during World War II - aid to Greece, which was facing famine, on board the ship "Kurtuluş".

He told Al-Jazeera Net, "When we look at diplomatic discourses today, it is necessary to interpret this more broadly in the context of the relationship between Turkey and Greece, and to define it as disaster diplomacy."

The head of the research center ruled out any change regarding the structural problems between Turkey and Greece, expecting the countries to stick to their positions on conflict issues.

He added, however, that "the earthquake enhanced the possibility of diplomacy," but that progress in this regard will depend on the position of the Athens administration, according to Errol.

At the broader European level, the General Assembly of the European Parliament opened its session by standing a minute of silence in memory of the victims of the earthquake in Turkey and Syria.

The European Union also announced that it will hold a donors' conference on March 16 to collect donations for the earthquake victims.


Paving the way for broader relations with Armenia

Like Greece, Turkey and Armenia's relations witnessed qualitative steps in terms of the stalled rapprochement between the two countries, as Yerevan opened the Alikan border crossing with Turkey for the first time in 35 years, to allow the passage of humanitarian aid to the earthquake-affected areas in Turkey.

Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan made a solidarity visit to Turkey on February 15, during which he affirmed his country's desire to establish peace between it and Turkey and fully normalize relations between them.

Basil Hajj Jassem, a researcher and writer in international relations who specializes in the affairs of the former Soviet republics, says that the devastating earthquake was the reason for the direct operation to open the border crossing between Armenia and Turkey, accelerating procedures related to a previous path of dialogue between the two countries.

The researcher believes, in his interview with Al-Jazeera Net, that it will become clear later if the process of opening the crossing continues or stops after a while, then it is possible to accurately determine whether the issue is related only to broad human sympathy, or that the crisis brought both matters together.

The humanitarian path and the path of political normalization that has been being worked on since a previous period?

Hajj Jassem stated that the growing Armenian-Turkish openness is linked to many issues, some of which are related to the bilateral relations between Yerevan and Ankara, and some of which are related to the relations between Baku and Yerevan, especially with regard to the Nagorno-Karabakh region.

The researcher pointed out that achieving the objective factors in each file will certainly pave the way for broader relations between Turkey and Armenia.