Merkel: Germany wants a stable Turkey
On her official visit to Turkey on October 18, German chancellor Angel Merkel had good results from her meetings with prime minister Ahmet Davutoglu and president Recep Tayyip Erdogan. She promised the future lifting of visas for Turkish citizens, financial assistance for hosting refugees, but also gave promises on the issue of Turkey’s accession course to the EU, in exchange for Turkey to take steps to address the refugee crisis.
Merkel, after emphasising that Germany “wants a stable Turkey”, promised to speed up Turkey’s accession process to the EU and said that “Germany would like to open chapter 17 and to make preparations for chapters 23 and 24. We can talk about the details”, Merkel said, passing the message that the long “frozen” accession talks will resume.
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(Photo: Bundesregierung/Henning Schacht)
