Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and Joe Biden stand together before a meeting about the Iranian nuclear program during the G20 Summit at the Roma Convention Center La Nuvola on October 31, 2021, in Rome, Italy. (Photo by BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI/AFP via Getty Images)
SRDTF News
UPDATED 5:35 PM PT – Sunday, October 31, 2021
Joe Biden met with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan at the G20 forum in Rome, Italy. The two met up for talks on Sunday, looking to discuss Turkey’s request for F-16 fighter jets and its support for radical Islamist groups in Syria and Libya.
Observers pointed out Biden scheduled meetings with Erdogan and Russia’s Vladimir Putin, but couldn’t make time to meet with President Vladimir Zelensky of Ukraine. Erdogan criticized the U.S. after meeting with Biden.
“I conveyed to Joe Biden our sadness with the support these terrorist organizations in Syria, like the Kurdistan Workers’ Party, the Democratic Union Party and the People’s Defense Units are receiving from the United States, and we, as a NATO country, expressed the sadness that this support causes us,” said Erdogan.
▶️ U.S. President Joe Biden met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan Sunday, as part of the G-20 meetings in Rome, Italy. (AP)
👉 Biden Meets Erdogan amid Simmering Tensionshttps://t.co/ps5d1LOrLs pic.twitter.com/H95AsMY6BU
— The Voice of America (@VOANews) October 31, 2021
President Trump used to criticize Erdogan for the abuse of human rights in Turkey and excluded Ankara from the F-35 jet program over its close ties to Russia. In the meantime, Biden has yet to publicly address any of those issues.