Russian President Vladimir Putin will arrive in Instanbul on Saturday to participate in the quadrilateral summit on Syrian settlement along with French President Emmanuel Macron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
The leaders will gather in this format for the first time. Such a format is not conceived as an alternative to other consultations on Syria, but will instead allow to compare positions on the solution of the common problem - restoration of peace and stability in Syria.
UN Special Envoy for Syria Staffan de Mistura, who will leave his post at the end of November, will also arrive in Istanbul on Saturday to brief the participants in the summit on the recent developments. De Mistura said earlier that he wants to remind the four leaders that after localizing the problem in Idlib, an international consensus is necessary to support UN actions on establishing a constitutional committee.
The Turkish president was the first to come forward with a proposal to hold a quadrilateral summit. Russia supported this initiative. In mid-September, aides on international issues to the leaders of Russia, Germany, Turkey and France met to discuss the substantive part of the summit.
The meeting between Putin, Merkel, Erdogan and Macron is scheduled to start at 2pm Moscow time. After the meeting, the leaders are expected to make statements for the press.
The Kremlin press service said earlier that the summit's agenda will also include "several other pressing international issues," but did not clarify what other topics might be covered. The leaders are also expected to hold a series of bilateral talks in addition to the quadrilateral summit.
