Diplomatic World 67

THE SIXTH DIMENSION IS MIGRATION
MANAGEMENT
Today, we are faced with a major challenge of irregular migration.
Turkey hosts 4.2 million people, the largest refugee community
in the world, of which 3.7 million are Syrians and the rest are
Asians, mostly from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Iran, Iraq,
Sri Lanka and Africans, etc.
This is a very heavy burden that we cannot assume alone and
we expect the EU side is to share this. We had some sort of a
deal with the EU related to migration. Within the framework of
the deal, we gave two promises; preventing illegal crossings and
taking back illegally crossed people from the Greek islands. We
kept our promises by taking all the people returned by Greece
until February 2020 and by preventing more than 2 million
additional refugees that could have otherwise gone to other
European countries beyond Turkey.
I remember the former president of the European Commission,
Mr Juncker, speaking at the European Parliament, saying that we
succeeded 97%. This is a huge success, thanks to Turkey. The
EU also gave four promises, which were unfortunately not fully
kept. The EU promised that for every refugee being returned to
Turkey from the Greek islands, a Syrian would be resettled to the
EU. The EU kept this promise of 1 to 1.
The second promise concerned a package of EUR 3+3 billion to
be mobilized by 2018. By the way, this money is allocated to the
refugees in Turkey. Unfortunately, in parts of Europe, people think
that this money is given to Turkey or transferred to the Turkish
national budget. The migration burden has so far cost us more
than EUR 40 billion. We are talking about only EUR 6 billion of
EU support for Syrians in Turkey and out of these 6 billion, only
EUR 4.2 billion has been spent as of today. The flow of the funds
is very slow, very bureaucratic, even though it is the fastest
mechanism in the EU system.
especially after the Afghan crisis, has to focus on cooperation in
and return to Northern Syria, cooperation on the Turkish-Iranian
border, joint action in source countries and fair burden sharing in
terms of financial support and resettlement.
We need to cooperate in Afghanistan, for example, through running
Kabul airport and creating necessary conditions to ensure
that young Afghans can stay and work in the country. It is not a
big deal. I served in Afghanistan and with small investment packages
you can create a big impact. Instead of spending EUR 600
per refugee in Turkey or in the rest of Europe, it is better to spend
maybe EUR 50-100 per person through some investment, which
is more sustainable and keeps people in their home country.
This is feasible since Turkey has a lot of influence in Afghanistan,
and there are many Turkish companies operating in the country,
building bridges, roads, dams, and running factories. I think we
need to create this opportunity for the young Afghans. Otherwise
it will be complicated for us to curb these irregular migration
flows towards us and in Europe.
ANOTHER A SPECT OF A POSITIVE AGENDA
WOULD BE TO ENABLE TURKISH CIVIL SOCIETY,
TURKISH STUDENTS AND RESEARCHERS TO FUL-
LY AND EASILY ENJOY EU PROGRAMMES SUCH
AS ERASMUS +, HORIZON EUROPE, SOLIDARITY
CORPS, CREATIVE EUROPE, ETC
There are around forty programmes and agencies and Turkey
decided to be part of 13 EU programme and agencies in 2021-27
period. The EU should facilitate Turkey’s association with these
programmes.
This is one of the reasons why I came to Brussels. I signed
three agreements with Commissioner for Innovation, Research,
Culture, Education and Youth Mariya Gabriel on Horizon Europe,
Erasmus + and the European Solidarity Corps.
H.E. Faruk Kaymakcı Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs and Director for EU Affairs Republic of Türkiye
What we are saying basically is that the EU should speed up this
Until now we have had 550,000 Turks who became part of
country of Western or Northern Europe, it is possible to see
For Turkish students, Erasmus + is a golden opportunity to dis-
flow of funds, but also increase the amount of funding, because
Erasmus or European Solidarity Corps. Some of them spent two
differences. The differences are good. These differences are our
cover the rest of Europe. The same goes for Horizon Europe: it is
the number of refugees is not decreasing. Unfortunately the num-
weeks in Germany in a factory. Some students went to Brugge to
richness. So I think this richness should be protected and we
important for our academicians, our researchers, our universities,
ber is increasing day-by-day and after the Afghan crisis, there will
produce Belgium chocolate and some French students came to
should enjoy this richness through these programmes.
our laboratories to engage and exchange with the rest of Europe.
be more refugees. Due to the pandemic millions of refugees are
my hometown to take care of the health of some animals in our
also expected to head towards Turkey and the rest of Europe. We
have to manage this better. Our new migration deal has to focus
on dealing especially with the situation in Northern Syria, which
is also the fourth promise of the EU. The Article 9 of 18 March
Statement requires joint endeavours by the EU, Member States
and Turkey to create better living conditions in Northern Syria to
veterinary institution.
Every single year, under Erasmus +, we have 20,000 university
students from Turkey going to other European universities. It is
important to give the right image of Turkey and Turks. We have
quite a lot of prejudices against Turkey, and this mentality has to
These programmes are so important to build personal connections.
For example, you send a student from Germany to Turkey
and this student has a prototype Turkish image in her/his mind:
“bloody aggressive Turks”. She/he thinks that döner kebab is
the only Turkish meal. But thanks to Erasmus, she/he discovers
that Turks are not different from others and there are other meals
THE LINK BETWEEN SPORTS AND DIPLOMACY IS
NOT OFTEN EVIDENT. COULD YOU EXPLAIN TO
OUR READERS THE IMPORTANCE OF SPORTS IN
TURKEY-EU RELATIONS?
enable safe return of the Syrians. This promise was never kept
change. Turks are an essential part of Europe. Turkey and Turks
and delights. But also by studying, by living in another country,
I would say it is vitally important because sometimes, some Turks
by the EU.
are part of the European history culture and civilisation. We might
trying to learn another culture and language, the personality of a
do not realise how European they are until their favourite team
have different food preferences or different ways of praying, but
student is developing with broadened horizons.
plays in the European Championships.
So what we are saying now is that the new migration deal,
these differences are everywhere. So even within the same
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