Turkey’s foreign minister Mevlut Cavusoglu has thanked Russian President Vladimir Putin for supporting Ankara during a recent attempted coup, the Interfax news agency reported Monday.
A total of 290 people were killed during the failed military coup against the government of President Recep Erdogan, which began on July 15.
“Russia gave us unconditional support during the attempted coup. We want to thank President Putin and all of Russia’s officials for that support,” Cavusoglu said on the Haberturk TV channel.
Unconfirmed reports surfaced last week that the Russian military had informed Turkish intelligence about preparations for a coup just hours before it began.
The Kremlin subsequently denied the reports.
Russia-Turkey relations were only normalized last month after President Erdogan officially apologized for the downing of a Russian plane by the Turkish air force in November. Russia subsequently lifted a raft of economic sanctions against the country, as well as a ban on package tours to Turkey on June 30.
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