Turkey, Syria pledge to boost financial cooperation

In talks in Syria including Turkish banking sector representatives, Deputy Prime Minister Nazim Ekren over the weekend met with Syrian Prime Minister Naci Otri and his Syrian counterpart Abdallah Dardari. Ekren's talks focused on economic and financial cooperation with Syria. Speaking at a joint press conference afterwards, Ekren said that better relations and political stability between Turkey and Syria in recent years have paved the way for developing economic cooperation between the two neighbors. In view of the strong will of the Turkish and Syrian leaders, bilateral economic ties should be strengthened, Ekren said. He also stressed the importance of better regional economic cooperation to help weather the global economic crisis. For his part, Otri said that they came to agreements on many matters after talks with Turkish bank officials ahead of a Turkish-Syrian joint economic commission meeting. Dardari said that economic and technical cooperation would be launched soon between the Turkish International Cooperation and Development Agency (TIKA) and the Syrian Planning Institution.