- Title: Turkey "expects complete support" from NATO allies over Syria crisis - Erdogan
- Date: 9th March 2020
- Summary: BRUSSELS, BELGIUM (MARCH 9, 2020) (REUTERS) ***WARNING: CONTAINS FLASH PHOTOGRAPHY*** TURKISH PRESIDENT TAYYIP ERDOGAN AND NATO SECRETARY GENERAL JENS STOLTENBERG POSING VARIOUS OF ERDOGAN AND STOLTENBERG
- Embargoed: 23rd March 2020 18:08
- Keywords: Erdogan European Union Nato Stoltenberg Syria Turkey
- Location: BRUSSELS, BELGIUM
- City: BRUSSELS, BELGIUM
- Country: France
- Topics: Diplomacy/Foreign Policy,Government/Politics
- Reuters ID: LVA001C4C0QX3
- Aspect Ratio: 16:9
- Story Text: PLEASE NOTE: TRANSLATION PROVIDED BY ON-SITE OFFICIAL INTERPRETER
Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan called on "complete support" from its NATO allies after meeting with NATO on Monday (March 9) over the crisis in Syria.
Erdogan was in Brussels to seek European financial, political and military support in talks on Monday with EU and NATO leaders but will be told he must first stop encouraging migrants to cross his country's borders into Greece.
Tens of thousands of migrants have been trying to get into Greece, an EU member state, since Ankara said on Feb. 28 it would no longer try to keep them on its territory as agreed in a 2016 deal in return for billions of euros in aid for refugees. Turkey hosts some 3.6 million refugees from Syria, where its troops are facing off against Russian-backed Syrian government forces.
The EU is keen to avoid a repeat of the 2015-2016 migrant crisis, when more than one million people, mostly from the Middle East and Asia, reached the EU via Turkey and Greece. That flow was largely halted by the 2016 deal, which the EU hopes to salvage, though Turkey now fears a new influx of refugees following an upsurge in fighting in Syria.
The EU says it has so far paid about half of a promised 6 billion euros to help Turkey finance housing, schools and medical centres for the refugees on its soil. It has dangled the prospect of further aid, but has yet to deliver.
(Production: Christian Levaux, Lucien Libert) - Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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