SHOTLIST:

WASHINGTON, USA (SEP. 25, 2025) (ANADOLU-ACCESS ALL)

1. SOUNDBITE (English) REPORTER ASKING:

“How would you summarize the meeting you were there as well from your side? How was it?”

2. SOUNDBITE (English) TOM BARRACK, US ENVOY TO TÜRKİYE, SAYING:

“Epic, epic. Yeah, I mean you should be so proud of your president. President Erdogan conducted himself like the man that he is. The team is first class, blended perfectly on all the issues with the U.S. team. President Trump was graceful, kind, understanding, strong on the issues that they need to talk to. They're both very strong men. I was privileged to be able to sit in the room after all of the noise that we have on all sides of things. And again going back to saying, you know, we've been hopeful before. I'm so hopeful. I mean, not due to this meeting. The issues with Syria continue to be consistency. Right? You have a young regime that has very limited resources. No one trusts them. Right? The Western world is saying, "How can you have a fundamentalist who is wearing guerrilla fatigues and shows up one day and says, 'Now I'm a statesman and I have a Tom Ford suit?' Well you can. Nelson Mandela did the same thing, right? Anakumbegan did the same thing. You can change points of view. Everybody's saying, "Okay, so how do we support him without over-committing?" Not the U.S. The U.S. is saying, "We support him because we're removing sanctions.” We'll help on everything, but it's you, the region, that have to give him the capital, the resources, the people, the understanding, even on a religious basis. What's the architecture of how you create an inclusive environment that's centralized but has the autonomy for the people so that the Druze can have their own religion, their own clothing, their own education, even their own regional security force. The same with the Kurds, the same with the Elites. It takes these guys just a little bit of time. My feeling is they're so well-intended. Al-Sharaa and Al-Shabani coming to the U.N. Can you imagine how frightened they must have been? And they weren't. But I was frightened for them saying, "Wow," if they knew what they were marching into. So it's baby steps.

I support, I just looked at history again. None of these fractured federalisms or confessionalisms have worked anywhere. Look at Lebanon. It's chaos. You say, "Okay, the president has to be a marinade. The prime minister has to be a Sunni. The speaker has to be a Shia." And we're going to divide up all the ministries based on religion. It's a disaster. Right? You have no unified entity. Iraq the same thing. Afghanistan the same thing. So you have to have a unified entity, but the unified entity has to go to all of its components and say, "I'm going to give you a better life than life you have." Until they see that, they don't want to give up whatever moderate life they have. So it just takes time. So I think it's happening.

So if you go back to lessons learned in history, you have to do it in tiny increments. You unwrap it like an onion. You don't take the whole onion. So we're starting. We're starting in pieces. And you can start with the fabric in Türkiye and then Syria. Lebanon is another issue. (….) Gaza has to end. Nothing. It's the 10,000-pound gorilla. Until Gaza ends, everybody's confused. What is the response to today with the van? What would you say? You have to ask them. But I think they're both in line with saying, "Gaza has to end." But what do you mean end? What does that mean? That means stop the senseless killing. Now you have two different views as to how does that get done. Everybody agrees, we have to stop the killing."

3. SOUNDBITE (English) REPORTER ASKING:

"The president seemed optimistic when he talked about his meeting with Arab and Muslim leaders in New York on Tuesday. Do you see this?"

4. SOUNDBITE (English) TOM BARRACK, US ENVOY TO TÜRKİYE, SAYING:

"I do. I'm holding my breath and I don't want to jinx anything. Right? Aren’t you tired of it? (…..) That’s all we have is optimism." WASHINGTON, USA - SEP. 25, 2025: President Donald Trump's more than two-hour sit-down with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was "better than great," the US envoy to Türkiye said Thursday.

"I think it was better than great, in my humble opinion. Two amazing leaders from very different parts of the world, from different points of view, had a real understanding and respect for each other," Tom Barrack told reporters outside the White House after the meeting concluded.

He went on to describe the meeting as “historic.”
“The team is first-class. Blended perfectly on all the issues with the US team,” Barrack told reporters following the Oval Office talks. “President Trump was graceful, kind, understanding, strong on the issues that they needed to talk (about). They're both very strong. And honestly, it was historic.”

When asked if the US supports a unified Syria, Barrack underscored his support for the country’s territorial integrity, stressing that fractured governance systems based on sectarian or ethnic divisions have failed elsewhere.

“None of these fractured federalisms or confessionalism have worked anywhere,” he said, pointing to Lebanon and Iraq as examples.

Asked about Gaza, Barrack emphasized the urgency of stopping the “senseless killing.”

“Gaza has to end...Until Gaza ends, everybody's confused,” he said. “I think they're both in line with saying Gaza has to end.”

When asked what he means by “end,” he responded: “That means stop the senseless killing...everybody agrees we have to stop the
killing.”

Barrack made the comments after the leaders met for over two hours, much of it behind closed doors, at the executive mansion followed by a working lunch.

Erdogan was earlier in New York to attend this year's session of the UN General Assembly. He arrived Wednesday in the nation's capital, where he stayed at Blair House, the US president’s official guest residence.