Refugee war between Erdogan and Europe rages with new pressure cards

Sarah Waheed

While Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan is trying to pressure Europe with the refugee card, the European Union has its own pressure cards to respond to the Turkish president’s ambitions and try to contain the crisis.

The European Union has prepared a plan that includes six items, including support in the form of the European Asylum Support Office (EASO) sending 160 experts from bloc countries to the crisis area and the European Border and Coast Guard Agency (Frontex) activating a new program to accelerate the return of people who are not allowed to stay in Greece.

Autism and complete prohibition

Dr. Tarek Fahmy, professor of political science at Cairo University, told the Reference that the European Union has a number of pressure cards to confront Erdogan, the first of which is banning the export of arms and ammunition to Turkey. There is also the card of financial aid, which was reduced at the beginning of this year and is expected to be reduced again.

Fahmy added that the initial sanctions that have been applied are weak and must therefore be developed by reducing the Turkish presence in Libya in order to control Erdogan’s ambitions in the Eastern Mediterranean region.

There is a division in the European Union, as some countries want to give Erdogan a second chance, which Erdogan uses to try to return to the EU, Fahmy said, adding that the most important pressure card at present is to unify the position of EU countries to deter Erdogan’s ambitions, as well as developing a system of actual sanctions and not only theoretical.

Economic cards

Turkish political analyst Jawad Joc explained to the Reference that the EU possesses economic cards that can be used against Erdogan, namely the trade facilities that are granted to Turkey. If Erdogan is pressed from that side, then it is likely that Turkey would be affected, especially as it is currently suffering from economic crises.

The European reactions revealed that Turkey’s attempts to pressure the EU did not achieve the expected objectives. On February 28, NATO members did not make any concrete promises to help Turkey in Syria.

The European Union condemned Turkey’s “unacceptable extortion” to gain EU support for Ankara’s aggression against Syria by taking advantage of European concerns about another migration crisis similar to the one in 2015.

Europe also announced that it would take a number of measures aimed at stemming the flow of refugees to its territories from the borders of Greece and Bulgaria.

Following the deployment of Greek army forces to secure the border crossings with Turkey, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis announced on February 28 that his country would not submit to Turkish threats and would not accept any refugees entering the country illegally.