Erdogan demands EU support over Syrian refugees

ANKARA - President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Thursday warned Turkey would be forced to open the doors to Syrian refugees fleeing to Europe if Ankara did not get more international support.

Turkey is home to more than 3.6 million Syrian refugees and recently called for a "safe zone" in the war-torn country's northeast, to which refugees could return. Turkish military operations have given it control of parts of north-east Syria.

The comments come as Turkey mounts pressure on Washington for further concessions on the depth and oversight of the planned safe zone, and as it comes under increasing pressure in Syria's northwest Idlib region where a Russian-backed government offensive has pressed north.

Logistical support

Only a small minority of Syrians in Turkey are from the northern strip roughly proposed for re-settlement, according to Turkish government data.

"We are saying we should form such a safe zone that we, as Turkey, can build towns there in lieu of the tent cities here. Let's carry them to the safe zones there," Erdogan said in a speech in Ankara.

"Give us logistical support and we can go build housing at 30 km depth in northern Syria. This way, we can provide them with humanitarian living conditions."

If the safe zone does not happen, "we will be forced to open the doors. You either give support, or if you won't, sorry, but we can only put up with so much," Erdogan said.

"Are we going to shoulder this burden alone?" he asked during the televised speech in Ankara. "We have not been able to get help from the international community, namely the European Union."

Erdogan claimed Turkey had spent $40 billion on refugees and criticised the West, especially the European Union, for failing to live up to its promises.

Under a 2016 agreement, the EU promised Ankara six billion euros ($6.6 billion) in exchange for stronger controls on refugees leaving its territory for Europe, but Erdogan said only three billion euros had so far arrived.

"We may be forced to do this (open the gates) to get this (international support)," he said.

Turkey fears a fresh influx of refugees as the Syrian government advances into the last rebel stronghold of Idlib. It also hosts hundreds of thousands of Iraqis and Afghans fleeing conflict in their countries.

The number of migrant arrivals in neighbouring Greece spiked last month. A week ago more than a dozen migrant boats carrying 600 people arrived, the first simultaneous arrival of its kind in three years.

Building pressure

Last month, Interior Minister Suleyman Soylu said only 17% of refugees in Turkey hail from northeast regions controlled by the US-backed Syrian Kurdish YPG militia, which Ankara considers a terrorist group. Of that region, the proposed safe zone would cover only a fraction.

Last week, senior Syrian Kurdish official Badran Jia Kurd said it is necessary to re-settle refugees in their home towns. "Settling hundreds of thousands of Syrians, who are from outside our areas, here would be unacceptable," he said of the north east.

In Idlib, where Turkey has troops and where Ankara in 2017 agreed with Moscow and Tehran to reduce fighting, months of renewed conflict intensified in recent weeks and raised prospects of another wave of refugees at Turkey's borders.

After a truce collapsed in early August, the Russian-backed Syrian army has gained significant ground against rebel forces, some of whom are backed by Turkey.

Nicholas Danforth, Istanbul-based senior visiting fellow at the German Marshall Fund, said warning about refugees in the context of the safe zone allows Erdogan to pressure both Europe and the United States at once.

"What seems clear is that it would be impossible to settle that many refugees in any zone achieved through negotiations with the United States and the YPG," he said.

"This looks like an attempt to build pressure for more US concessions on the safe zone, where some refugees could then be resettled for purposes of domestic (Turkish) public relations."

In a further bid to pressure the United States, which is to jointly patrol the safe zone, Erdogan said Turkey was "determined to set it up by the last week of September."

He added that 350,000 Syrians had already returned to parts of the country brought under Turkish control during offensives in 2016 and 2018.

"Our goal is to settle at least one million of our Syrian brothers and sisters in a safe zone along the border 450-kilometres long," he said.