Turks, Saudis eye deeper ties with King Salman's visit

Turkey and Saudi Arabia will seek to further deepen bilateral relations on the occasion of Saudi King Salman's two-day visit to Ankara, which will observe the meeting of a high-level strategic cooperation council with the participation of a number of ministers from both sides. 

Accompanied with a very large delegation, Salman is expected to arrive in Ankara to pay his first official visit to Turkey on April 11 upon the official invitation of President Recep Tayyip Erdo?an. After concluding meetings in Ankara, the Saudi delegation will move to Istanbul to attend the 13th Organization of Islamic Cooperation (OIC) summit which will take place on April 14 and 15. 

The two leaderships are expected to review ongoing cooperation in the number of different fields, including trade and the economy, as well as to coordinate mutually concerning foreign policy issues. 

With Salman coming to Turkey after concluding a trip to Egypt, it's believed that strained Ankara-Cairo relations will also be on the agenda, as Erdo?an had already commented that the Saudi leadership was pressing on both sides to reconcile their relations. Egypt will also be present at the OIC summit at the foreign minister level. 

Another top issue will be the ongoing unrest in Syria, as both sides share a similar line that requires the toppling of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad. Saudi Arabia deployed four warplanes to Turkey's ?ncirlik Air Base in recent months to actively participate in the international efforts to defeat the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL). 

Salman and Erdo?an are expected to evaluate recent developments in the field, as the cessation of hostilities continues in Syria amid U.N.-led efforts to reach a political settlement to the problem...