Turkey boosts Qatar support
Turkey sent a first ship of food supplies to Qatar yesterday and was also sending a small contingent of soldiers, media reported, while President Tayyip Erdogan spoke with Saudi Arabia's leaders on calming tensions in the region.
Turkey has backed Qatar after Saudi Arabia, Egypt and other Arab states cut all economic and diplomatic ties with Doha this month, accusing it of supporting terrorism, a charge it denies.
Ankara has also sought to keep up good relations with the rest of the Gulf and sources from Erdogan's office said he spoke by phone overnight with Saudi Arabia's King Salman and new crown prince Mohammed bin Salman, congratulating the latter on his promotion.
"Agreement was reached on increasing efforts towards ending tension in the region related to Qatar," the sources said in a statement regarding the phone calls yesterday.
Turkey's parliament fast-tracked legislation on June 7 to allow more troops to be deployed to a military base in Qatar that houses Turkish soldiers under an agreement signed in 2014.
According to the website of the mainstream Hurriyet newspaper, 25 soldiers and five armoured vehicles were being sent to Qatar yesterday to join 88 Turkish soldiers already there. Turkish officials were not immediately available to comment.
After the deployment, a joint exercise by Turkish and Qatari forces was expected following the Islamic Eid al-Fitr holiday, Hurriyet said. The number of Turkish soldiers sent to the Gulf state could eventually reach 1,000, it said, adding that an air force contingent was also envisaged.
Economy Minister Nihat Zeybekci said Turkey has so far sent 105 cargo planes of supplies.
"It is not economical or sustainable to send normal food supplies by airplane," he told state-run Anadolu news agency on Wednesday, adding that it was beginning to send aid by ships and by road. He said that alongside food supplies, consumer durables and household goods would also be sent.
The first Turkish ship carrying some 4,000 tonnes of dry food supplies, fruit and vegetables set off from a port in western Turkey's Izmir province at dawn yesterday, Anadolu said.
It cited the head of the logistics company delivering the supplies as saying it was expected to arrive in Doha in around 10 days. The sources in Erdogan's office also said he and King Salman agreed to hold face-to-face talks at the G20 meeting in Hamburg next month.
King Salman made his son next in line to the throne on Wednesday, handing the 31-year-old sweeping powers as the kingdom seeks a radical overhaul of its oil-dependent economy and faces mounting tensions with regional rival Iran.
Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu made a tour of Gulf capitals last week, including Riyadh and Doha, in the hope of finding a solution but his visit appeared not to bear any fruit.
Ankara has stopped short of directly criticising Saudi Arabia's actions, merely calling on Riyadh to take a lead role in solving the crisis.