Turkish PM warns EU over refugee deal ahead of Syrian peace talks
Turkey’s prime minister has warned that the country has the power to allow millions of refugees to resume their journeys to western Europe if the US and EU-backed Kurdish forces fighting in Syria are given a role in peace talks.
A sixth round of UN-sponsored Syrian talks to find a political solution for the six-year conflict is due to resume in Geneva on Tuesday, and Turkish opposition to any role in the talks for the Kurdish forces, the YPG, is likely to prove one of many stumbling blocks. Turkey regards the Syrian Kurds as inextricably linked to the Kurdish militant organisation, the PKK, which operates inside Turkey.
Speaking after a meeting with Theresa May in London on Monday, Binali Yıldırım said it was possible for Turkey to renege on its agreement with the EU, under which 3.5 million refugees from neighbouring Syria have settled inside Turkey instead of heading for western Europe.
Insisting Turkey is essential to Europe’s security and had prevented more than 53,000 foreign fighters reaching Syria and Iraq, he said: “We know how much [of] a headache the PKK constitute. If there is tolerance vis-a-vis these organisations in the long term, Europe will be endangering its own.”
Yıldırım stressed he was not threatening Europe, but was merely reminding the bloc that Turkey has the power to unblock the route. While he said Turkey remained committed to joining the EU, he bitterly denounced an agreement signed last year with the bloc intended to deal with the Syrian refugee crisis as a “big, big lie”.
He accused the EU of failing to stick to a bargain struck in March 2016 in which Turkey would be granted visa liberalisation and cash in return for keeping Syrian refugees within its borders.
“We neutralised thousands of Daesh [Isis] fighters and we are currently welcoming 3.5 million refugees in Turkey. What happens if we were tell them: ‘Here’s Europe, off you go’. Can you imagine what will happen? Of course ... it is not something we will do.”
Yıldırım also said he expected the US to show goodwill towards Turkey by terminating its relationship with the YPG, including the provision of arms.
He said: “We see the YPG as a terrorist organisation and [it] has no place in the peace process. It will become one of the most sensitive issues for us.”
For the US, however, the YPG has been vital to the defeat of Isis in Raqqa, and some US state department officials believe a Syria wide settlement has to include some form of federal power for the Syrian Kurds.
Yıldırım initially said he was sure Turkey’s new partners in the Syria peace process – Russia and Iran – shared its view on barring the Kurds from any role, but added later “Iran understands our position better”. Russia, he said, merely respected Turkey’s position.
Yıldırım also reaffirmed that Turkey did not believe that the crisis in Syria could be resolved while President Bashar al-Assad remained in power. “The current regime is responsible for the way things have evolved in Syria ... I don’t think it’s a realistic prospect to build lasting peace in Syria with Assad [in place],” he said.
Syria has not yet confirmed that its delegation will attend the Geneva talks.
Yıldırım was in London in part to discuss the initial progress on a post Brexit trade deal, as well as co-operation on the development of a Turkish stealth fighter, the TF-X project.
Following his talks with May in Downing Street, Yıldırım said the two countries had begun work on a post-Brexit free trade agreement and set up a joint working group, which met for the first time earlier this month.
He said that while a deal could not be finalised until the UK had actually withdrawn from the EU, the preparations would take place “in parallel” with the Brexit negotiations.
“These will take place simultaneously. It is not like we will first wait for the UK to finish Brexit and then see what happens,” he told reporters. “That is not the kind of approach we have in mind. That would be wrong. Work has already started on it and it has to start.”