A senior Turkish diplomat arrived in the Azerbaijani capital of Baku on Friday to relay a special letter of Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev.

Feridun Sinirlioglu, the undersecretary of Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Turkey, met Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Elmar Mammadyarov.

Sinirlioglu is expected to meet President Ilham Aliyev later on Friday.

The diplomat earlier visited Armenia.

Diplomatic sources said Sinirlioglu would brief Azerbaijani executives on his meetings in Armenia, and learn about their views before a nuclear security summit Erdogan would participate in Washington, D.C. on April 12 and 13.

The same sources said Azerbaijan was not invited to that summit because only the countries that had nuclear programs were invited.

They said Ankara felt uneasy over Washington's inviting Armenia, but not inviting Azerbaijan to the summit, and this uneasiness had been expressed to the U.S. administration.

Sinirlioglu earlier this week visited the Armenian capital of Yerevan, as Erdogan's special envoy, to meet Armenian President Serzh Sargsian and Foreign Minister Eduard Nalbandian.

Turkey and Armenia signed two protocols on October 10, 2009 to resume diplomatic relations and open their border crossing.

After years of no diplomatic contacts, Turkish President Abdullah Gul travelled to Yerevan to watch a soccer game between Turkish and Armenian national teams in September 2008.

The Armenian president came to Turkey to watch the return game in 2009.


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