said Austrian Foreign Minister Alexander Schallenberg at his meeting with his EU colleagues in Brussels. Turkey's behavior in conflicts such as Libya or the gas drilling off Cyprus which the EU has classified as illegal showed that the country is
"simply not a reliable partner of Europe".Schallenberg called to the EU for "a policy with a strong edge towards Turkey". He reaffirmed Austria's position to end negotiations with the country on joining the EU."I believe that the European Union should also make a clear cut here."
Given the mass arrests of government critics after the failed military coup in Turkey in 2016, negotiations with the EU are already on hold. EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell described the relationship with Turkey as "not particularly good".
It is now a matter of how the EU should proceed. Relations with Turkey "had developed in the wrong direction," said Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn.
It is "very bad" that Ankara is "fighting terrorists" as humanitarian activists and trying to assert hegemonic interests in the Mediterranean against international law.
The conversion of Hagia Sophia into a mosque was also "a blow to the alliance of civilizations" and removed Turkey further from Europe.
Despite the many conflict issues, the EU also regards Turkey as a partner in migration policy and supports the country with billions of dollars in the care of millions of refugees from Syria. Just last week, the EU had approved an additional 485 million euros for this,
which should flow until the end of 2021. In a refugee agreement of 2016, the EU had promised Ankara a total of six billion euros. According to the EU Commission, 3.4 billion euros have been paid out of this, the remaining funds have already been planned.
The Turkish government has accused the EU of paying the money too slowly and has repeatedly threatened to terminate the agreement.
Turkey committed itself in the refugee pact to take back all new migrants arriving on the Greek islands and to take action against gangs of smugglers. This led to a massive drop in arrivals in Greece.
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