Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is set to visit China to improve ties with Beijing amid growing discord between the two countries over Ankara's protests on the curbs on Uygur Muslims in the restive Xinjiang from observing Ramzan.
Chinese Foreign ministry spokesman Lu Kang said that Erdogan will pay a state two-day visit to China beginning tomorrow at the invitation of Chinese President Xi Jinping.
Erdogan is expected to be accompanied by a delegation of around 100 businesspeople and discuss trade and security issues, official media here reported.
Analysts said Erdogan's visit will likely strengthen bilateral communication on political issues, which Beijing sees as "fundamental" to economic and other cooperation.
"The topic of Xinjiang will be unavoidable during the bilateral talks, since Turkey's comments on the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region have become a constraining factor in the development of bilateral ties," Zhu Weilie, director at the Institute of Middle East Studies at Shanghai International Studies University, told state-run Global Times.
Violent protests broke out in Istanbul this month, with protesters targeting the Chinese consulate and a Chinese restaurant after media reports alleged that China had banned Uyghur Muslims, a Turkic-language ethnic group, from participating in Ramzan.
A group of Korean tourists who were mistaken as Chinese also faced the wrath of the protesters.
The Turkish foreign ministry issued a statement, saying it was "deeply concerned" over such reports.
China denied the allegations, stating that all ethnic groups are entitled to freedom of religious belief.
China is battling the violent attacks in Xinjiang by East Turkestan Islamic Movement (ETIM), a separatist outfit which has become active among the 11 million Uyghurs who are Turkik language speakers sharing close ethnic ties with Turkey.
"It is not surprising that the visit has triggered all kinds of conjectures, especially about ETIM. After all, the anti-Chinese protests have caused detrimental effects on the bilateral relationship," an article in the Global Times said.
"Some Turks are sympathetic toward ETIM forces and are always orchestrating events in order to expand their influence. This will inevitably harm the Beijing-Ankara relationship.
"The situation will become even more complicated after the issue of the ETIM has been intertwined into the internal affairs of the Ankara government by certain political factions," it said.
