Weighing options: Erdoğan attends SCO summit as Fidan talks BRICS

Erdoğan at the 2022 Shanghai Cooperation Organization Summit. © TCCB

İSTANBUL – Gauging Ankara’s foreign policy posture is never simple, but looking at the blocs in Turkish Pres. Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s calendar might serve as a guide.

Starting today, the Turkish leader will attend the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit, then the Organization of Turkic States summit on July 6 and the NATO 75th anniversary summit in Washington on July 9-11.

Of the three events, the SCO summit might draw the most attention after Turkish FM Hakan Fidan’s recent statements about joining BRICS, in which he suggested Ankara is seeking to expand its economic alliances due to a lack of progress with European Union negotiations.

Strained as they might be, Turkey-EU ties will not be replaced by Ankara’s stated interest in the SCO and BRICS, according to foreign policy experts. Instead, they argued, Turkish officials are weighing their options under pressure from tough economic conditions at home and instability abroad, though some warn time is running out for an EU-Turkey course correction.

“Although we are not there … I think Turkey and the EU are moving towards a permanent rupture that could lead to Turkey eventually joining another economic union,” Özgür Ünlühisarcıklı, Ankara director for the German Marshall Fund, told Turkey recap. “It's not too late to prevent this.”