Saudi Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman will visit Turkey next week, a Turkish official said on Friday, as Ankara and Riyadh mend relations following the 2018 killing of journalist Jamal Khashoggi in Istanbul.
This is Prince Mohammed's first visit to Turkey since the brutal killing of Saudi journalist and critic Salman in the kingdom's consulate in Turkey, which shocked the world.
Saudi Arabia's de facto ruler is expected to visit Ankara on June 22, but details of the trip will be announced "over the weekend," a senior Turkish official told AFP.
The two countries will sign several agreements during his trip, as Turkey seeks financial support from non-Western partners amid rising inflation.
Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan already visited Saudi Arabia at the end of April, where he met with Prince Salman.
Saudi agents killed and dismembered Jamal Khashoggi, who wrote for the Washington Post in October 2018. His remains have never been found.
Turkey angered Saudi Arabia by vigorously pursuing the case at the time, opening an investigation and reporting gruesome details of the killing to international media.
Erdogan previously said the "highest levels" of the Saudi government ordered the killing, although he never directly blamed the prince.
But as ties improved, an Istanbul court halted the trial in absentia of 26 Saudi suspects linked to Khashoggi's death and transferred the case to Riyadh in April.
Repairing relationships
Relations between the two countries were frozen for more than three years after Khashoggi's murder.
Saudi Arabia then responded with an unofficial boycott of Turkish imports, putting pressure on the Turkish economy. Turkish exporters complained that their goods were stuck at Saudi customs for longer than necessary.
Now with inflation reaching 73,5 percent in May and the cost of living rising a year before presidential elections, Erdogan needs support from the Gulf states, experts say.
"Turkey's main concern would be to get Saudi funds to resupply the central bank's coffers, which are dangerously low," Asli Aydintasbas, a member of the European Council on Foreign Relations, told AFP.
The Turkish lira has lost 44 percent of its value against the dollar in 2021 as the central bank has pumped billions of dollars to prop up the currency.
Over the past 18 months, Turkey has also sought to mend relations with powerful countries in the region such as Israel and the United Arab Emirates.
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