Turkey’s President wants air bridge between Istanbul and Bucharest to strengthen cooperation with Romania

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan asked the Romanian authorities to allow Turkish Airlines to launch another daily flight between Romania and Turkey, as Turkish investors are more active in Romania. Erdogan made an official visit to Romania on Wednesday, April 1, and had meetings with President Klaus Iohannis and Prime Minister Victor Ponta. He also attended the Romania-Turkey business forum. “If flights between Romania and Turkey were low a few years ago, now we have three Turkish Airlines flights each day and we have requested a fourth flight,” Erdogan told Turkish and Romanian businessmen who attended the forum. He pointed out that more than 10,000 firms with Turkish investors currently operate in Romania. Turkey is also Romania’s biggest trade partner outside the European Union. “The trade between our two countries is EUR 6.3 billion, but, as I discussed with Prime Minister Ponta earlier, we set an objective to reach USD 10 billion,” Erdogan said. He added that he supports Romanian investments in Turkey and will work on removing barriers to business. Erdogan also said that Romania should eliminate visas for Turkish citizens, which would increase the number of Turkish tourists to Romania. He pointed out that 425,000 Romanian tourists visited Turkey last year. For comparison, only 42,500 Turkish tourists visited Romania in 2014, according to Romanian statistics. Romania’s President Klaus Iohannis said on Wednesday that Romania will support Turkey’s EU accession plans while Prime Minister Victor Ponta said that Romania must follow Turkey’s example in terms of economic progress and infrastructure development. editor@romania-insider.com