ANKARA (Dispatches) -- Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Wednesday Turkey is looking into establishing new trade mechanisms with Iran, like the INSTEX system set up by European countries to avoid U.S. sanctions reimposed last year on exports of Iranian oil.
Those sanctions followed President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw unilaterally from a 2015 nuclear accord between Iran and six world powers.
Cavusoglu reiterated Turkey’s opposition to the sanctions and said Ankara and neighboring Iran needed to keep working to raise their bilateral trade to a target of $30 billion, around triple current levels.
"Along with the existing mechanisms, we evaluated how we can establish new mechanisms, like INSTEX...how we can remove the obstacles before us and before trade,” Cavusoglu told a news conference after talks with his Iranian counterpart Muhammad Javad Zarif.
"What is important here is the solidarity and determination between us,” he added.
France, Germany and Britain have opened a new channel for non-dollar trade with Iran to avert sanctions, dubbed The Instrument In Support Of Trade Exchanges (INSTEX).
Washington’s European allies opposed Trump’s move to abandon the 2015 deal, under which sanctions on Iran were lifted in return for Tehran accepting curbs on its nuclear program.
Iran has threatened to pull out of the deal unless the European powers enable it to receive economic benefits. The Europeans have promised to help companies do business with Iran as long as it abides by the deal.
Cavusoglu did not go into details about the new mechanisms but Turkey has a track record of using national currencies in international trade. In October 2017, the Turkish and Iranian central banks formally agreed to trade in their local currencies after using the euro for settlements in the past.
After reimposing sanctions on Iran, Washington granted waivers to eight nations including Turkey that reduced their purchases of Iranian oil, allowing them to keep buying it without incurring sanctions for six more months.
Presidential spokesman Ibrahim Kalin told reporters in Washington on Tuesday that Turkey expected the United States to extend Ankara’s waiver.
Zarif also met with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, and the two sides stressed the need to promote cooperation, including in the economic sector.
Zarif said earlier Wednesday in a joint news conference following bilateral talks with Cavusoolu that he would submit a report to President Erdogan about his "long meeting" with President Bashar al-Assad in Turkey.
"I had a long meeting with Bashar Assad. I will be giving details of these discussions to Mr Erdogan," he said.
Turkey supports militants opposed to Assad and Iran backs the Syrian government in its long war with terrorists, but the two sides have been expanding contacts amid international efforts to end the fighting.
Kazakhstan will host a fresh round of talks on Syria on April 25-26 in its capital, recently renamed from Astana to Nur-Sultan.
"In Syria, from the start, on the ground, we do not agree with Iran on many issues. But we have decided to cooperate with Iran for a political solution," Cavusoglu said.
Zarif also said Iran acknowledges Turkey's concerns about the PKK-linked People's Protection Units (YPG) in Syria.
"We understand the concerns of Turkey about terrorist groups in Syria and we agree with them. The security and peace of the Turkish people are very important to us. We enjoy very thorough cooperation on this issue," Zarif said.
Cavusoglu said Turkey would continue to explain to the U.S. that sanctions targeting Iran are wrong. He said that Turkey conveys this message to U.S. officials in all platforms.
"Our ministers expressed Turkey's concerns to U.S. counterparts in a recent meeting," he said, in reference to Treasury and Finance Minister Berat Albayrak and Trade Minister Ruhsar Pekcan's visit to Washington, where they met with top U.S. officials, including President Donald Trump.
Cavusoglu also criticized the U.S. decision to put Iran's Islamic Revolution Guards Corps (IRGC) on its terror list.
"This is an extremely wrong decision," he said, adding that the listing foreign national armies as terror groups would lead to "dire" cracks in the international system and international law order.
"Then, trust in the global system will suffer and there could be total chaos," he added, urging caution.
Cavusoglu also said Washington's decision to recognize the occupied Golan Heights as Israeli territory was against international law and would only increase tension in the region.
"We do not and will not recognize these kinds of decisions," he added.