News Analysis: Turkey-Russia ties thaw amid gas deal

Turkey and Russia has reached a significant moment in relations as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin set aside disagreements and sealed an energy agreement on Monday on the sidelines of the 23rd World Energy Congress in Istanbul.

Despite differences over Syria, the two leaders signed an intergovernmental agreement on long-delayed Turkish Stream natural gas project.

The project, initiated by Putin in 2014 as an alternative route to the canceled South Stream project that would pass through Bulgaria, intends to deliver Russian gas to Turkey and European markets through the Black Sea.

The project was suspended following Turkey's downing of a Russian warplane in November 2015, but negotiations resumed after Ankara and Moscow moved to revive their relations in late June.

The project was later brought back to the agenda, which reduced its total capacity from 63 billion cubic meters (bcm) per year to 31 bcm, with 15.75 going to Turkey and the remaining part to the East Europe, according to Necdet Pamir, an energy expert and instructor at Bilkent University.

They are drawn together because both are "stuck" against the EU and the United States, said Pamir.

Sanctions imposed by the U.S. and the EU due to Russia's annexation of Crimea, he said, are the primary concerns for Putin in his decision to normalize ties with Ankara.

"He wants to enter Turkish markets with great potentialities and consolidate the current agreements," he said.

Likewise, Erdogan needed rapprochement with Moscow because of the developments in the Middle East and Ankara's tensions with the EU and the U.S., Pamir told Xinhua.

The pipeline will pave the way for Russia to reach European markets at a time when Moscow is suffering economic sanctions from the EU over Crimea, which was incorporated into Russia from Ukraine in 2014 following a referendum, he said.

"Turkey is our neighbor and a partner that is important to us. Our trade volume surged to 35 billion U.S. dollars in 2014, but it decreased by almost 40 percent in the first eight months of 2016 compared to the same period of 2015 due to the diplomatic crisis," Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak was quoted as saying by daily Hurriyet on Monday.

Besides the Turkish Stream, Akkuyu nuclear power plant is another crucial project that plays a key part in normalizing the ties between the two countries.

"In the normalization process, energy is one of the key areas. Both the Turkish Stream and the Akkuyu power plant are crucial projects that will revive our ties," Novak said.

The icy ties between Ankara and Moscow began to thaw in June when Erdogan wrote a letter to Putin to express his deep sorrow over the jet incident.

The two countries have since increasingly normalized relations with telephone calls and meetings between their leaders. Endit