Kristy Ram­nar­ine

kristy.ram­nar­ine@cnc3.co.tt

The num­ber of T&T na­tion­als vis­it­ing Turkey has been on the rise, sig­nalling grow­ing in­ter­est and stronger ties be­tween the two na­tions.

This was re­vealed by Turk­ish Am­bas­sador Ayşe Sel­can Şan­lı dur­ing the Re­pub­lic of Turkey’s Na­tion­al Day cel­e­bra­tions on Oc­to­ber 29 at The Re­nais­sance at Shore­lands.

“The up­ward trend in the num­ber of vis­i­tors from Trinidad and To­ba­go to Turkey is sol­id proof that the fu­ture of the Trinidad and To­ba­go–Turkey re­la­tion­ship is bright, marked by a com­mit­ment to trans­form­ing po­ten­tial in­to con­crete ac­tion,” Am­bas­sador Şan­lı said.

She not­ed that diplo­mat­ic re­la­tions be­tween Turkey and T&T date back to May 22, 1972, and are built on a sol­id foun­da­tion of mu­tu­al re­spect and co­op­er­a­tion.

“While ge­o­graph­i­cal dis­tance has his­tor­i­cal­ly kept re­la­tions mod­est,” she said, “Turkey’s out­reach pol­i­cy to­ward the Latin Amer­i­can and Caribbean re­gion has brought fresh mo­men­tum. Fur­ther­more, Trinidad and To­ba­go’s en­gage­ment with the wider re­gion aligns with Turkey’s com­mit­ment to strength­en­ing mul­ti­lat­er­al ties and ad­dress­ing re­gion­al chal­lenges.”

Rep­re­sent­ing the Gov­ern­ment of T&T, Min­is­ter of For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Sean Sobers de­scribed the grow­ing part­ner­ship as one of mean­ing­ful col­lab­o­ra­tion and shared op­por­tu­ni­ty.

“Agree­ments be­tween our na­tions are more than for­mal­i­ties—they serve as path­ways to op­por­tu­ni­ty and blue­prints for fu­ture suc­cess,” he said.

“We are com­mit­ted to deep­en­ing our col­lab­o­ra­tion, whether in trade, tourism, ed­u­ca­tion, or en­er­gy, and to ex­plor­ing new ar­eas of mu­tu­al ben­e­fit.”

Min­is­ter Sobers al­so com­mend­ed Turkey’s en­gage­ment with Cari­com and its par­tic­i­pa­tion in mul­ti­lat­er­al plat­forms, not­ing that such ef­forts ad­vance shared pri­or­i­ties and strength­en di­a­logue on the glob­al stage.

He ex­pressed op­ti­mism that bi­lat­er­al ties will con­tin­ue to flour­ish through di­a­logue and co­op­er­a­tion.

“The Gov­ern­ment re­mains ded­i­cat­ed to ad­vanc­ing our part­ner­ship, en­sur­ing that our ef­forts re­sult in con­tin­ued pros­per­i­ty for both na­tions,” Sobers added.

This year’s cel­e­bra­tion marked the 102nd an­niver­sary of the procla­ma­tion of the Re­pub­lic of Turkey, com­mem­o­rat­ing the coun­try’s trans­for­ma­tion in­to a mod­ern re­pub­lic in 1923.