09 June 2016

Germany v Turkey

The unfriendly warm-up to Euro 2016.

By Neil Tidmarsh

Germany has a problem; Turkey has the solution. Turkey has a problem; Germany has the solution.

Jolly good. Sorted. Done and dusted. Isn’t it?

Well…

Germany’s problem is that it is bearing the brunt of the refugee crisis in Europe.  Most of the migrants fleeing warfare, tyranny and poverty are heading for Germany.  Its thriving economy, its open borders within Schengen, and Chancellor Merkel’s well-meant but naïve and reckless words of welcome, are exerting a well-nigh irresistible gravitational pull across Europe, across the Mediterranean, through Turkey and deep into the Middle East and Africa.  But most of the migrants are coming through Turkey; if Turkey could be persuaded to patrol its coast to stop migrants setting sail for Europe; if it would agree to take back the migrants already marooned in Greece in return for genuine refugees accepted from refugee camps in Turkey…

Turkey’s problem is that it’s bearing the brunt of the refugee crisis outside Europe.  It’s even more of a crisis for Turkey than it is for Europe.  There are getting on for three million refugees in Turkey already – most of them from Syria, others from Afghanistan and Iraq – and there are more on the way, as long as the country is seen as a bridge-head into Europe.  That’s a huge burden for Turkey to bear.  But perhaps Europe, led by Germany, would help to bear it; it would be in its interests to help Turkey with the costs of it; and if the two co-operated to create a more rigorous control of migration, then Turkey’s pull as the door into Europe would diminish…

Each party’s problem is the other party’s solution.  What could be neater?  So it appeared three months ago, when the EU (led by Berlin) and Turkey reached an agreement; the EU would contribute millions of euros towards the costs of looking after all those refugees in Turkey; Turkey would patrol its coast to prevent migrants setting out to sea towards Europe; Turkey would take back any migrants that did make it to Europe; and Europe in return would take in as many genuine refugees from Turkish camps.  And as a bonus, Turkey was promised visa-free travel for its citizens in the Schengen zone, and a fair wind for its application to join the EU.

However, it wasn’t long before both sides were needling and poking and shoving each other like a pair of rival school kids after a teacher had found them rowing, knocked their heads together and ordered them to co-operate and help each other instead.  It’s almost as if they’re trying to sabotage the deal before it even gets under way.

It began with Turkey exclaiming that it wasn’t to be bought by EU gold.  Which didn’t stop President Erdogan from demanding – and getting – €6 billion, double the original €3 billion (fair enough, however, anything’s worth trying in a negotiation).  It continued with the sacking of prime minister Ahmed Davotoglu, the man behind the plan and one of its main champions.  And now President Erdogan is refusing to pass the last few of the seventy-odd criteria the EU is insisting upon before visa-free travel is granted.  In particular, he is refusing to relax his country’s strict anti-terrorism laws, especially the recent ones which have removed immunity from Kurdish members of parliament (and which many commentators believe are only stoking up the violence of the Kurdish insurgency).

Perhaps we shouldn’t be surprised that President Erdogan is compounding his own problems (see This Could Never Happen  Issue 3, 30 July 2015). But perhaps we should be surprised that Germany seems to be playing the same game.

The public and political support offered to the comic Jan Bohmermann, who recited a satirical poem insulting President Erdogan on German TV, was provocative to say the least.  The support was offered under the banner of free speech, but free speech didn’t come into it; no one has the right to publicly accuse anyone – whether king or pauper, good man or bad – of sexual perversion, at least not without then standing up in court and proving those allegations.  Even more provocative is this week’s vote in the Bundestag to recognise the killing of 1.5 million Armenians by the Ottoman Turks in 1915 as a genocide.  The motion was proposed by the government and passed almost unanimously by all parties.  This is an extremely sensitive topic in Turkey.  Turkey complained to the German charge d’affaires in Ankara and withdrew its ambassador from Berlin in protest.

This is not the place to discuss whether those killings were a genocide under the very specific definition that word now has by law, nor the serious legal obligations such an accusation puts on both the accusers and the accused.   The point here is the timing of the German government’s motion, a motion which is sure to further inflame European/Turkish relationships precisely when co-operation between the two is crucial but already uneasy.

Already the consequences of all this shoving and prodding and needling are evident.  There are signs this week that cross-Aegean migration is picking up again, with hundreds of refugees arriving on Lesbos, Samos and Crete from Turkey.  There are also signs that the land route from Turkey to Europe is opening up again; six hundred Syrian refugees arrived in Serbia, having travelled via the Balkans.  Not only has Turkey stalled in implementing the required relaxation of its anti-terrorism laws; the EU has stalled on the implementation of visa-free entry for Turkish citizens, which should have been ready on June 1.  It seems that the EU/Turkish deal to control migration is in very real danger of collapsing.

The longer you follow current affairs, the more you realise that it is impossible to overestimate the human ability to mess things up; to change a win-win situation into a lose-lose one.  And very often it’s hard not to suspect that they do it deliberately, for whatever perverse reasons.  You don’t have to look far to find other examples.  Post Arab Spring Egypt is a good one – after the fall of Mubarak, the future looked great for that country – international goodwill was so strong, the international community was so keen to help in any way it could, that it seemed that nothing could go wrong.  But as things happened… Surely people have to work really hard to make such a mess of such a promising situation? It’s a definite socio-political phenomenon. There should be a word for it.

The EU/Turkish agreement, championed by Berlin, should be a game where both sides win.  But Turkey and Germany are so busy putting the ball into the back of their own nets that it looks as if it’ll be a game which both sides will lose.

They will both be playing in the Euro 2016 tournament.  Germany is in Group C, Turkey is in Group D.  But they may well meet sooner or later.  And if they follow the same game-plan as their governments, it will be a very interesting match indeed.  Although one or the other of them may well be working on a strategy whereby losing their own games will somehow ensure that the other side progresses no further than the first round.

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