Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday told a regional summit attended by Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin that he wanted the war in Ukraine to end “as soon as possible”. Erdogan has been trying to use his good working relations with Moscow to try and persuade Putin to hold direct ceasefire talks with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Turkey. He told a meeting of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation in ex-Soviet Uzbekistan that Turkey was making diplomatic efforts to end the war. “We are making efforts to finalise the conflict in Ukraine through diplomacy as soon as possible,” Erdogan said.