US President Donald Trump made a significant statement on the future of sanctions on Turkey at the NATO summit held in Ankara. Meeting with President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at the Presidential Complex, Trump said, 'I can say that we could lift the sanctions.'
Trump also referred to Turkey's military strength, saying, 'Turkey has become a very strong country militarily under your leadership, (President Erdoğan).'
The sanctions under the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act (CAATSA) entered into force on April 7, 2021, due to Turkey's purchase of the S-400 air defense systems from Russia. The imposition of these sanctions was the result of a process that lasted about three years.
The CAATSA law was first approved by the US Congress in 2017. Turkey's S-400 purchase was first raised in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) for the 2018 defense budget, and a report on the matter was requested from the Department of Defense.
In its report submitted to Congress in November 2018, the Department of Defense noted that Turkey's S-400 purchase was certain and that its negative impact on US-Turkey relations and Turkey's role in NATO would be inevitable. In response, Congress imposed restrictions on the delivery of F-35 aircraft to Turkey in the NDAA for the 2019 defense budget.
In the NDAA for the 2020 budget, Turkey's receipt of the S-400 systems in July 2019 was defined as a 'significant financial transaction' with the Russian defense and intelligence sector under CAATSA. The law required the President to impose at least five of the CAATSA sanctions on Turkey within 180 days.
Under the CAATSA law, the US State Department published a list of Russian defense and intelligence companies subject to sanctions on October 27, 2017. The Almaz-Antey Air and Space Defense Corporation, which produces the S-400 systems, was second on this list.
Although CAATSA sanctions on Turkey had been mentioned verbally since 2017, they were officially included for the first time in the 2020 National Defense Authorization Act, which was enacted in December 2019.
