BRUSSELS — Turkey’s president derided Europe on Friday for not taking in more refugees — a dose of cold water for a European Union plan to give new aid and concessions to Ankara in exchange for stemming the unprecedented flow of people across borders.
EU leaders meeting at a summit in Brussels into the early hours of Friday agreed to give “political support” for an action plan for Turkey to help it manage its refugee emergency, including easier access to EU visas for Turkish citizens and sped-up EU membership talks. The hard part, though, is persuading Turkey to sign on, and raising money to make it work.
The EU package for Turkey would involve at least 3 billion euros ($3.4 billion) in aid, officials said. But member countries have been slow to offer money for the refugee crisis overall, and are divided over how much to help migrants and how much to help Turkey.
Many issues remain to be resolved, and discussions will continue, with Turkey’s EU minister, Beril Dedeoglu, visiting Brussels on Tuesday for talks with top budget, economy and membership officials.
In a speech on Friday, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan did not address the refugee offer but accused the EU of being insincere about Turkey’s membership.
“We are far ahead of most EU countries but unfortunately, they are not sincere,” Erdogan said.
He took a swipe at those who suggested German Chancellor Angela Merkel for the Nobel Peace Prize for opening Germany to so many refugees this year.
“We have 2.5 million refugees, no one cares,” Erdogan said.
Turkey hosts more refugees than any other country in the world. Hundreds of thousands are sheltered in the refugee camps, but many more are left to fend for themselves. Europe has seen 600,000 new arrivals this year.
After a decade of membership talks where the EU had the upper hand, now the EU needs Turkey’s help to ease the refugee crisis.
But EU leaders are concerned about moves by Erdogan toward the Kurdish minority and the media and justice system. Erdogan’s government has been pushing for a long time for looser visa rules, which would be a vote-getter for his party in Nov. 1 elections
French President Francois Hollande said he “insisted that if there is a liberalization of visas with Turkey … it should be on extremely specific, controlled terms.”
Merkel, who is going to Turkey on Sunday, said the plan would mean that “on the one hand, Turkey enters into commitments with regard to the handling of refugees within its own country and, on the other hand, that we are ready to share the burden with Turkey.”
“We still must clarify the timelines, what should happen, when, how reliable our promises of support are, how reliable Turkey’s promises of regulation are,” she said early Friday.
EU President Donald Tusk expressed “cautious optimism” about securing an agreement with Turkey on what he called “a demanding and difficult issue.”
The deal “makes sense only if it effectively contains the flow of refugees,” he told reporters after the summit.
The plan would see Turkey improve its asylum and documentation procedures and beef up border and coast guard numbers. The idea is to help stop people entering Turkey in search of work there or in the EU, and then prevent both them and refugees in the country from moving on to Europe.
Erdogan last week demanded EU support to establish a no-fly zone and safe area in northern Syria, saying it was the only way to stop people leaving. While the EU believes the U.N. Security Council is the forum for taking that process forward, it has assured Turkey that the bloc would provide humanitarian support were such a safe haven to be established.
Turkish officials have not publicly released details of their demands. Foreign Minister Feridun Sinirlioglu confirmed on Friday that there is a draft deal on the refugee plan, but he said there was no final agreement.
He said the money would be used for the refugees and would be separate from any funds that the EU allocates Turkey. “It will be an amount large enough for them to say ‘we are shouldering the responsibility,’ ” Sinirlioglu said.
