EU-Turkey Deal Unravels

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EU-Turkey Deal Unravels

May 18th, 2016

Awake Goy

Angela Merkel’s grand “EU-Turkey Deal” has started to unravel over Turkey’s refusal to meet the basic demands for anti-terrorism laws as requested by Brussels.

Turkey has now threatened to open the gates for the millions of invaders in that country to once again cross into Europe if their demands are not met.

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The deal is foundering on the question of Turkey’s inability to meet certain minimum passport security demands—and an existing Turkish counterterrorism law.

Among five remaining benchmarks for Turkey to address in order to receive visa-free travel, the EU has called for changes to Ankara’s legislation on terrorism—a demand criticized and rejected by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavusglu told a meeting of businessmen in Vienna that his government will not change its counterterrorism law, charging that EU pressure on the issue constitutes “support for terrorism.”

Çavusglu said Turkey would not yield to pressure from the EU to change its legislation on terrorism in return for visa-free travel in the Schengen zone.

“You [the EU] have given visa-free travel to candidate countries without even starting the negotiation phase. Isn’t it then the right of Turkish citizens to enjoy this too? We are talking about visa-free travel, not membership,” he said.

Last Wednesday, the European Parliament halted the visa liberalization process for Turkish citizens in the Schengen zone, citing Turkey’s failure to fulfill the necessary criteria.

The sticking point is Turkey’s anti-terrorism law, which the EU says is too broad and must be tightened before the EU can grant Turks visa-free travel.

The EU wants Ankara to sharply narrow his definition of “terror” to prevent recent cases like the prosecution of academics and journalists for publishing “terror propaganda.”

EU Affairs Minister Volkan Bozkir said that Turkey’s anti-terror law had allowed for more than 1,800 cases against people for insulting Erdogan since he became president in 2014, including journalists, cartoonists, and teenagers.

Meanwhile, Turkish Member of Parliament for Erdogan’s party, and Former Chairman of the Committee on Constitutional Affairs, Burhan Kuzu, warned on his Twitter account that “If the EU makes the wrong decision, we will release the refugees”—a direct threat that a refusal to open the EU borders to Turks will result in a renewed mass invasion.

German Interior Minister Thomas de Maizière expressed skepticism that Turkey will fulfill all criteria for visa exemption.

“The Turkish president is unwilling to meet the criteria,” de Maizière said. “If he does not, then there will be no visa-free process.”

Even the notoriously left wing President of the European Parliament, Martin Schulz, admitted that he saw “no chance” of the EU adopting a visa-free regime for Turkey by its target date of the end of June.

“Two of the key enablers, namely data protection and the anti-terrorism package have not even been addressed, never mind solved,” Schulz said.

Erdogan had again rejected the EU demands for a change in the anti-terror laws only on Monday. On Tuesday, he said, “I hope they [the EU] keep their previously given word and that they draw a line under this matter no later than October.”

* The former head of Britain’s MI6 secret service, Sir Richard Dearlove, has warned that “offering Turkish citizens visa-free access to the European Union would be like storing gasoline next to the fire.”

Speaking to BBC Radio 4, Sir Richard said that “to offer visa-free access to 75 million Turks to stem the flow of migrants across the Aegean seems perverse, like storing gasoline next to the fire one is trying to extinguish.”

Referring to what he called “right-wing parties,” Sir Richard said that the nonwhite invasion was having a “geopolitical impact” which is “set to reshape Europe’s political landscape as those citizens who feel, rationally or not, that their interests and cultural identity are threatened assert their influence. This has already happened in Austria with the resurgence of the Freedom party. Other extreme right populist parties in other European countries will follow.”