Turkish Official: "Ankara May Resume Football Diplomacy with Armenia"
On October 17, Akif Çağatay Kılıç, the Chairman of the Turkish Parliament's Foreign Relations Commission, stated that Ankara may again conduct football diplomacy in the process of normalizing relations with Yerevan.
The draw for the Euro 2024 qualifying round took place earlier this month. The Armenian national team got into group D, where Turkey, Croatia, Wales, and Latvia were its rivals. The Armenian football team will play the first qualifying tournament game with the Turkish team on their field.
"On March 25 in Armenia and in September in Turkey, football matches of the two countries' national teams will take place. Our team will go there. Maybe we [Turkish politicians and diplomats] will go there too. The normalization process is progressing positively. Positive dynamics are also observed in the relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan. This must be done without resorting to provocations," Kılıç added.
Earlier, in September 2008, at the invitation of Serzh Sargsyan, the then President of Armenia, to a football match in the qualifying tournament for the World Cup between the national teams of Armenia and Turkey, then Turkish Prime Minister Abdullah Gül arrived in Yerevan. Later, Sargsyan, at the suggestion of Gul, attended the Turkey-Armenia return match, which took place in October 2009 in the city of Bursa. The process of normalization of relations, which led to the signing of two protocols on October 10, 2009, in Zurich, was called "football diplomacy." The heads of the foreign ministries of Russia, the USA, France, and Switzerland took part in the signing ceremony of the said documents in Zurich.
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