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EU-Turkey deal? We’ll think of some way… After all, tomorrow is another day

After all this fancy stuff – Angelina Jolie, Government Crisis – in the last few hours, I am supposed to write a post about the perspectives of European Union leaders and national interests to strike a deal with Turkey at the European Council Summit tomorrow, Thursday, and Friday. The official EUCO schedule is : EU makes a review and evaluation of the situation on Thursday, it strikes a deal with Turkey on Friday morning.

There have been preparation meetings in Brussels but much to my humble opinion, little hope for a sustainable solution.

Chancellor Angela Merkel briefed the German Parliament on the Refugee Crisis and the Migration issue in Europe.

Merkel: “It doesn’t do honor to Europe that it hasn’t yet managed to share the burdens.”

Merkel: Dublin system reform is also necessary. With this we will be able to uphold Schengen in the long-term.

EU leaders will take up Dublin reform in April!

The majority of EU leaders and European institutions officials have not said something new. They just try to find a short-sighted solution, a temporary one, and push the whole issue under the table. It is a common tactic and Scarlett-O’-Hara strategy: cover up now, think about it later, and Scarlett’s famous quote “after all, tomorrow is another day.”

Under this time frame the deal would expire in the summer, typically a high-point for refugee flows.

1:1 resettlement scheme with Turkey to be temporary, lasting weeks or months, before switching back to a voluntary scheme, says EU source

EUCO’s major issue is less the refugees themselves but the bargain deal with Turkey: re-admissions of refugees and migrants from the Greek islands but of those arriving in Greece after the EU-Turkey deal, visa-free for millions of Turks and reopening of Ankara’s EU accessions chapters, mainly concerning economic issues.

But these issues are not easy to agree upon. With Erdogan persecuting everything that walks, swims and flies, Turkey has major human rights issues.

EU is not giving Turkey ‘a free ride’ with migrant deal – EU’s Commissioner Timmermans warned today

The visa-free issue is difficult as German government (Merkels’ CDU and CSU) but also France raises objections.

And furthermore, it is the illegal occupation of Turkish Army in Cyrpus that could put a stop to the planned deal. Cyprus objections could indeed derail the EU-Turkey deal.

“Relations between Nicosia and Ankara are still bad – with Turkey not even recognizing Cyprus – and the latter’s EU membership in 2004 brought those tensions to the European level. In 2006, after repeated refusal by the Turkish government to allow Cypriot ships and planes to access its ports, the EU froze talks on eight negotiating “chapters” in Turkey’s membership bid. When the re-opening of five chapters was discussed at an EU-Turkey summit in November, Cyprus immediately used its veto.

Cyprus’ major interest is a reunification of the island and recognition by Turkey. Nicosia hopes to achieve those goals through U.N.-led peace talks, which have made tangible progress in past months. With negotiations approaching a crucial point, there is little interest on the Cypriot side to lift its veto — which gives it leverage over Turkey — to back the migration deal.” (via Politico.com)

And yet, it is not just Cyprus, supported by Greece, that could derail the deal. It is also Austria, Bulgaria, Hungary and Spain. Each and every EU member state for its own reasons.

So far, I did not read somewhere around the internet of any provision about the future of the 45,000 refugees and migrants already in Greece. Merkel repeated today her mantra “We stand by Greece” and tomorrow we will hear it also from any EU official involved.

The thousands of refugees and migrants will have to stay in a country they do not want to, that is in Greece. And await that one by one, two by two may be re-settled to other European countries – not of their choice, of course – within the next years? decades? never?

Some 12,000 refugees are stuck in Idomeni camp and refuse to move to camps in other areas across Greece, before the EUCO Summit is over. They hope that the EU leaders will decide on some extra provisions for them on Thursday and Friday. Most likely, they won’t.

Can the EU surprise us positively? I wish I’m wrong, but I hardly believe that.

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3 comments

  1. Turkey can demand what it likes and do what it wants because it’s the key country for USA’s ME war aims right now. As for human rights issues…poof! immaterial to NATO!

    However Turkish membership is the EU’s longtime super-nightmare, requested by our North Atlantic “partner” what? 20? years ago. Someone is having a good laugh somewhere, having successfully mixed this into the migration crisis. A fox amongst chickens!!