Vladimir Putin, War Criminal and Prime Minister of Russia was in Turkey today for a short time visit on the energy issues; there were protest rallies against Putin in Ankara and Istanbul.

On August 6, 2009 Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the Prime Minister of Turkey and Vladimir Putin met in Ankara; bilateral cooperation, regional and international issues were on their agenda but the main topic of the meeting was energy. This one was the nineth meeting of Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Vladimir Putin in last five years.

According to Turkish and Russian medias, to be extension of Blue Stream-2 natural gas pipeline till Israel, Samsun-Ceyhan Oil Pipeline, South Stream natural gas pipeline, nuclear power plants and to construction of a natural gas storage under the Tuz (Salt) Lake by a Russian company issues were talked. According to news at media, after begining function of the Blue Stream-2 and Samsun-Ceyhan Oil Pipeline, Russian natural gas and oil can be reach until India, so that Turkey will be the most important intersection of energy line in the future. During the meetings Ankara offered to transportation of the Russian oil via Samsun-Ceyhan Pipeline instead of Burgas-Dedeagac Pipeline, because the harbor of Dedeagac is small and the there isn’t such kind of problems at Ceyhan, so the oil transfer will be stronger.

Nine agreements were signed today and three of them were very important for both of sides. The first one is about the South Stream Project. Russia wants by-pass to Ukrania on this project, cause of their political strifes. So Russia wants to use Turkish glaucoma on Black Sea. In this aim, Russia and Turkey signed an agreement for feasibility research of Black Sea. Russia’s project partner is Italian Eni company, so Silvio Berlusconi, the Prime Minister of Italy attended to signature ceramony on this point. The second one is about oil exportation of Russia for Samsun-Ceyhan Pipeline Project. This agreement is important for Turkey because the Samsun-Ceyhan project couldn’t be operational cause of Russia was refusing to export his oil, with this agreement the project will start to work and there will be less oil tanker in Turkish water gaps. And the third one is about cooperation in peaceful nuclear energy. There is planning to build a nuclear power plants in Akkuyu town of Turkey with the Russian-Turkish joint venture. But there is some problems on the price of electricity generation and there will be more discussion on this topic.

Turkish and Russian media were descriped this meeting as historical; but this opinion is far away from the reality. In last 5 years, there were many agreement between Turkey and Russia, but Turkey couldn’t get what they were dreaming. For example, Russia would sell the natural gas and Turkey would pay 80% of  its price with selling something; but unfortunately Russia has made it more difficult, Russia’s stringent rules just working for Turkey: many times vegetables and fruits send back to Turkey, 70% of Turkey’s outward trade materials checking one by one so Turkish shipments has to wait very long days on the border of Russia. There were an agreement about simplifield visa regime between Russia and Turkey; Turkey started to give visa for Russians on the borders but for Turkish people everyday it is getting harder to get a Russian visa.

Although both Erdogan and Putin rejected that “their agreements doesn’t paralyze to Nabucco project; their protocols just about diversity of energy lines, all that claims aren’t true”, but it seems Putin’s visit and protocols has just one aim Russia doesn’t want to lose his control on the energy games.

As previous trips of war criminal Putin, there were some protest meeting against him. The members of Greenpeace met to Putin with their protests in Ankara. The protesters used to Russian matrushka dolls. There were a big matrushka Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inside of it there were Vladimir Putin doll and skull dolls were in the Putin. The protesters held banners like “energy revolution now”, “Nuclear?“, “No thank you”.

The second protest meeting was in Istanbul. It was organized by Imkan-Der, a Turkish civil society initiative. The protesters carried to Chechen flags and banners which were in English, Turkish and Russian languages as “Murderer Putin, Go Away From Turkey!”, “Long Live Independet Caucasus”, “Shame on You Puppet Kadirov”. The managers of the initiative and Imran Abdulazimov, sometime ago Turkey wanted send back him to Russia spoke at the meeting.

Photos from protest of Greenpeace in Ankara:

Photos from protest of Imkan-Der in Istanbul: