No money for Turkey

The European Commission intends to donate a considerable EUR 244 million to Turkish President Erdoğan in 2019. Officially, this is called ‘pre-accession aid’ to assist Turkey with preparing for EU membership. MEP Sander Loones is critical: “The European Parliament stressed last year that accession negotiations with Turkey ought to be formally suspended if Erdoğan were to introduce his new constitution. Everything suggests that we are heading in that direction. It is therefore inconsistent to donate hundreds of millions of euros to Erdoğan anyway. That money would be better invested by Europe in the much-needed deals with countries of origin to organise more and better asylum shelter in the region and thereby limit migration to the EU at the same time.”

In the first round of the Turkish elections, President Erdoğan was re-elected. His AK party also won the parliamentary majority together with coalition partner MHP. It looks as though Erdoğan, with this result in hand, can now go on to implement the constitutional amendments that were approved by referendum in 2017 (by a small majority) as well. These changes would grant him even more powers.

Sander Loones: “The European Union must prove its metal. What is striking is that last week the Council appointed Turkey as a partner country, expressly using the term, ‘prospective member country’. I expect the European Parliament to adopt an even clearer position, and therefore call for a formal end to negotiations with Turkey. That would at last bring Parliament into line with what we have already voted for here. And we would send a strong counter signal to the 48% of the Turkish population not having voted for Erdoğan, which they justifiably expect of the European Union.”

“As far as the N-VA is concerned, it is clear: Turkey is a strategic partner, but not a prospective member of the EU. And it is for this reason that we must cancel Turkey’s accession funding,” Sander Loones concludes.