Turkey declared it would not restrict the displaced person seeking refuge in Europe as the violence escalated following the Assad regime’s attack on Turkish troops.
The move threatens the deal signed by turkey in 2016 to stop the influx of refugees to gain monetary benefits for hosting refugees.
Following the opening of Turkish borders for refugees, dozens of people were identified as crossing the river and trying to enter the neighboring regions including Greece.
Turkey is already warning to go ahead with such moves, as it accuses the European Union of not keeping its promises.
The Turkish foreign ministry stated, “We have been calling for a more equitable burden and responsibility-sharing for a long time”.
He maintained, “All our efforts contributed significantly to the security of Europe. However, our calls were ignored by the EU and member states”.
As stated by the United Nations refugee agency, turkey is hosting the largest number of displaced persons across the world, more than 3 million Syrians are in turkey.
Turkey also directs the swaths of Syria’s Idlib while hosting three operations executed in the region targeting the fighters it believed to be “terrorists”. Turkey has invested schemes to restore these regions to facilitate “voluntary returns” of refugees it is hosting currently.
Aksoy said “We are the largest refugee-hosting country in the world since 2014” Aksoy said. “If we take into account of Syrians in northern Syria, we practically assume the burden of more than nine million Syrians”.
The rights groups criticized the European Union deal signed in 2015-16 that came as the influx of refugees reached the bloc by sea.
The number remained 123,663 in 2019 including sea arrivals to Cyprus, Italy, and Malta. There were both sea and land arrivals to Spain and Greece.
Since the implementation of the 2016 deal, there was a massive reduction in the number of refugees arriving in Greece. The deal included terms like loosening of visa restrictions for turkey. However, the Turkish officials argue that Brussels is not respecting agreement on its part concerning those issues. The European Union assured to turkey a grant of six billion for refugees’ related projects. The first installment of 2.47 billion has been released from which 2.15 has been invested for refugees projects.
Ankara accused that the EU has been slow in releasing the remaining amount of grant promised to Ankara.
Erdogan said “We will not close those doors … Why? Because the European Union should keep its promises” while referring to the issue of refugees entering the Turkish region.
Angela Merkel, the German chancellor said Ankara is “facing a very big challenge regarding Idlib”.
She said, “Still, for me, it’s unacceptable that he – President Erdogan and his government – are not expressing this dissatisfaction in a dialogue with us as the European Union, but rather on the back of the refugees”.
She added, “For me, that’s not the way to go forward”.
Both Turkey and the United Nations have predicted a humanitarian crisis in case the Russian backed Syrian regime does not stop violent acts in Idlib.
Moscow and Damascus believe the military operations are aimed to overthrow “terrorists” from Idlib, which was declared a de-escalation zone in the 2018 agreement between Turkey and Russia. The Turkish interior minister said more than 130,000 refugees had left for Greece from turkey. While Greece claims that 139 refugees have entered the region illegally that was prohibited from entering Greece territory.
Erdogan vowed to keep the door open for refugees moving to Europe saying, “No one can cross the Greek border. All those attempting illegal entry, are effectively prevented from entering. Numbers cited by Turkish authorities are entirely false and misleading”.
A Greek government spokesperson said “The present situation is an active, serious, severe and asymmetrical threat to the national security of the country. These … people are being used by Turkey as pawns to exert diplomatic pressure” while referring to the issue.–Worldwide News