President Erdogan stresses Türkiye-Iran cooperation to promote development, stability in region

By Merve Berker

ANKARA (AA) – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said on Wednesday that Ankara and Tehran should strengthen their cooperation in order to promote development and stability in the region.

“We have not terminated and will not terminate our economic and trade relations with our neighbor Iran due to sanctions,” Erdogan said at a joint press conference with his Iranian counterpart Ebrahim Raisi shortly after their meeting and the signing of 10 agreements.

Erdogan stressed that improving bilateral relations would not only benefit the two countries, but the entire region.

Türkiye is “determined to reach the $30 billion trade target with Iran,” he asserted.

Referring to the ongoing Israeli war on Gaza, the Turkish president expressed: “Victory in this process will be of our Palestinian brothers.”

He added that the issue is on the focus of both Ankara and Tehran.

“We are working and will work with all our might to stop the massacres, establish a cease-fire, and open the way to permanent peace in the region,” he underlined.

Raisi, for his part, praised bilateral cooperation between the two neighboring countries.

Regarding the Israeli war on Gaza, the Iranian leader criticized the US's support for Israeli decisions, as well as the "dysfunctionality" of international institutions, including the UN.

“At a time when international organizations are losing their function, we definitely need to strive for a new and just world order,” he stressed.

He stressed international community that “cutting off political and economic relations with the Zionist regime will be a deterrent to ending these Zionist murders.”

Earlier, the Health Ministry in the blockaded Gaza said on Wednesday that the Palestinian death toll from Israeli attacks on Gaza since Oct. 7 has jumped to 25,700.

The ministry in a statement said 63,740 others have also been injured.

Israeli forces committed 24 massacres across the Gaza Strip in the past 24 hours, killing 210 people and wounding 386 others, the statement said, adding: “Many people are still trapped under rubble and on the roads and rescuers cannot reach them."

Israel has pounded the Gaza Strip since a cross-border incursion by Palestinian group Hamas last October, in which nearly 1,200 Israelis are believed to have been killed.

About 85% of Gazans have since been displaced, all of them are food insecure and the health system is collapsing. Hundreds of thousands of people are living without shelter, and ⁠less than half of aid trucks are entering the territory than before the start of the conflict.