As of Sunday evening— more than a day after the proclaimed victory of President-elect Joe Biden, there has been no official congratulatory message or Tweets from Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
And it could be a sign of things to come in the U.S.-Turkey relationship, which directly impacts Greece.
Turkey stands to lose more than most other countries when Joe Biden takes over the White House in January.
If Biden stays true to his harsh words against Erdogan, he is expected to toughen the U.S. stance against the Turkish president’s foreign military interventions, closer cooperation with Russia and aggressive posturing against Greece and Cyprus.
In January 2019, Biden blasted Erdogan as an “autocrat” and told The New York Times editorial board that he would support “opposition leadership” in Turkey “to be able to take on and defeat Erdogan. Not by a coup, not by a coup, but by the electoral process.”
Turkey’s main opposition leader, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, was the first politician in the country to congratulate Biden. In a Tweet posted in Turkish and English, Kılıçdaroğlu said “I look forward to strengthening Turkish-American relations and our strategic alliance.”
In October, Biden again blasted Erdogan in a campaign advertisement in which he said “Unlike President Trump, I know what it takes to negotiate with Erdoğan. And if I were president, I would make him pay a heavy price for what he has done,” referring to Turkey’s incursions into northern Syria.
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