ANKARA: Turkey’s blocking of Russian aircraft flying to Syria is a calculated move to maintain its balancing strategy, experts have said.

Following a meeting of top Turkish officials with their Russian and Ukrainian counterparts, Turkey closed its airspace to Russian civilian and military aircraft carrying soldiers to Syria.

The decision will be valid for three months.

During a visit to Uruguay on Saturday, Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu told reporters that Turkey had been giving Russia consent to use its airspace in “three-month intervals.”

However, the last period of consent expired earlier in April, and the flights have stopped.

On opposing sides, Russia, Iran and Turkey have been key players in the Syrian battleground, where the Kremlin and Tehran supported Syrian President Bashar Assad in political, logistical and military terms, while Turkey gave its support to rebel forces.

Following the closure of Turkish airspace, Russian aircraft will only be able to pass through Iran and Iraq to reach Syria.

Turkey has acted as a mediator between Russia and Ukraine since February. The much-awaited meeting between Russian and Ukrainian leaders is expected to take place in Turkey. The airspace move is seen by some experts as leverage for Turkey to persuade Russia to restart peace negotiations.

On Saturday, Turkish Defense Minister Hulusi Akar met his Ukrainian counterpart Oleksii Reznikov to discuss the war.

The Turkish economy enjoys significant tourist flow and energy imports from Russia, which could be threatened as a result of Ankara avoiding the renewal of the airspace agreement.

Samuel Ramani, associate fellow at the Royal United Service Institute, said that Turkey’s blocking of Russian flights to Syria reflects its discontent with Russia’s plans to annex southern Ukraine and much of the Black Sea coast.

“Turkey views itself as a Black Sea power, and would see such a major disruption of the geopolitical balance in the region as very problematic,” he told Arab News.

As part of the Montreux Convention regarding the Regime of the Straits, Turkey also limited the passage of Russian warships from the Black Sea to the Mediterranean at the beginning of Ukraine war, but commercial flights from and to Russia remained intact despite Western embargoes on Russian flights.

According to Ramani, Turkey is also facing more pressure from the US and EU to sanction Russia, which it has so far resisted. He added that Turkey’s new move is “a great way” to reinforce its commitment to NATO efforts to counter Russia.

“It is unclear whether this move will fundamentally overhaul Turkey-Russia cooperation in Syria, especially in Idlib, where joint patrols are moving, and Turkey still seems interested in mediating between Russia and Ukraine. So far, Russian media outlets and officials have been relatively silent on this development, which suggests that they are hoping this issue blows over,” he said.

Emre Ersen, an expert on Russia-Turkey relations from Marmara University in Istanbul, said that though Turkey has avoided placing sanctions on Russia, it has also made its pro-Ukrainian stance “very clear” since the beginning of the war.

“This latest decision in this sense could be interpreted as a sign of Turkey’s support to the West, which has been critical about Ankara’s neutral position regarding the anti-Russia sanctions,” he told Arab News.

Ersen said that though the Turkish move will upset Russia, as it is increasingly isolated in the international arena, Moscow is unlikely to alienate Ankara as a result.

“Syria has already become secondary in terms of Russian foreign policy in the last few months due to the ongoing war in Ukraine. This is also why Russia will likely follow a wait-and-see policy about the implications of Turkey’s latest decision,” he said.

Although many analysts have already lauded the decision as a strong sign of support to Ukraine, Karol Wasilewski, Director of Actionable Analytics, Warsaw-based Analytical Agency NEOŚwiat, said the move has more to do with Turkey-Russia dynamics in Syria.

“Turkey wants to deter Russia from using humanitarian issues as an instrument of foreign policy and an element of pressure on Turkey, particularly from blocking the extension of the use of the Bab Al-Hawa border crossing for the delivery of humanitarian aid. Since the current mandate expires in July 2022, I think that the decision to close the airspace should be seen in this context,” he told Arab News.

Concerns are rising over the possibility that Russia may consider closing the Bab Al-Hawa border crossing – the last remaining point through which international humanitarian aid is delivered to Syria — if tensions escalate further between the West and Kremlin over the Ukrainian conflict.

More than 1,000 aid trucks cross the border crossing between Syria and Turkey each month to deliver basic needs to 3.4 million people living in the northwestern Idlib area.

Turkey’s restriction of Russian warships is a clear signal to Russia that Ankara intends to hit Moscow’s interests in Syria, Wasilewski said.

“It’s true that Russia has more burning problems now, but Syria has always been seen by Russian decision-makers as a card to use in their grand bargain with the US, a process that — in Russians’ eyes — was aimed to also decide the fate of Ukraine,” he said.

Wasilewski added that Turkey’s signals on Syria are “worrying” for Russia, because they undermine Moscow’s ability to use Syria as a bargaining chip with the US.

“This not only serves the aim of distracting Russian decision-makers, but also forces them to rethink their grand strategy,” he said.