Energy factor in Turkish-Russian relations (1991-2017)

Nowadays, energy has become one of the most important factors in the international arena. Energy shapes every kind of state foreign policy and it also manages its international relations. Rapid development of the Turkish economy caused continuous increase in the energy demands of the country. Therefore, insufficiency of the Turkey's own energy resources along with geographic proximity of Russia, which is an energy giant, led to the development of the long term energy cooperation between two countries. Until this period, Turkish-Russian relations were actually proceeding in a competitive manner and therefore could not ensure a solid cooperation between countries. In the 1990s after the collapse of the USSR Turkey and Russian Federation started to develop energy cooperation, a foundation of which had been laid even earlier in the 1980s. The success of the cooperation on the Western Pipeline Natural Gas Pipeline has led to the convergence of countries and to the preparation of new joint energy projects between two countries. The development of the bilateral relations and especially the putting of the Blue Stream gas pipeline into operation in 2003 defined the line of the foreign policy between Turkey and Russia. Since this period, the interest of the countries has increased and bilateral cooperation has gained a new dimension in a very short time. The success of the energy cooperation between two countries led to the development of the cooperation in cultural, educational, scientific and other areas. This cooperation, especially cooperation on the Blue Stream Project, has shown that it is durable and productive during the crisis periods of the beginning of 2000. Increased confidence between countries resulted in the joint projects like the Turkey's first nuclear power plant Akkuyu in 2009 and the Turk Stream natural gas pipeline in 2014. In 2015 energy was one of the main factors in the process of solving the War Plane Crisis in the Turkey-Russia relations. In this way, the energy sector became the main agenda of Turkish-Russian relations in the 21st century and became the main factor determining the mutual policy line of the countries. This thesis handles the development process of the Turkey-Russia energy cooperation and its impact on the bilateral relations. Keywords: Turkey, Russia, Energy, Natural gas, Nuclear power.