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From: TT
Published:
Photo: Patrick Semansky / Pool / AP / TT
Mike Pompeo, right, with Patriarch Bartholomew I at St. George’s Church in Istanbul.
The US Secretary of State is in Turkey, but is not greeted by his Turkish counterpart or any other high-ranking politician.
Relations between the two NATO countries are frozen and the Ankara government calls the issue of Pompeo’s travels on religious freedom “completely irrelevant.”
So while Pompeo meets with religious leaders in Istanbul, President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavusoglu say they are busy elsewhere.
“It is an incredible privilege to be here,” the US Secretary of State told Bartholomew I, the ecumenical patriarch of Constantinople, in the city of millions.
– It was a scheduling problem, a source close to Pompeo explained why he does not hold political meetings in Turkey.
The Foreign Minister is on a major tour that also includes France, Georgia, Israel, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Qatar.
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