ISTANBUL (AP) – Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had harsh words Friday for Europe, saying his nation won’t reform its anti-terrorism legislation just for the sake of getting visa-free travel for its citizens there.
The tough talk comes at a time when moderate Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu has stepped down, a move that Erdogan’s critics fear will help the president further consolidate his power.
As part of an agreement in which Turkey will help halt the flood of migrants and refugees from the Middle East, the European Union asked the nations in the bloc to allow Turkish citizens to travel to Europe without visas on short stays. In exchange, the EU wants Turkey to meet certain conditions, among them a revision of its harsh anti-terrorism laws.
But Erdogan has been pressing for quite the opposite: He wants Turkish law to impose a broader definition of terrorism at a time when the country faces the twin threats of renewed conflict with Kurdish militants in the southeast and growing blowback from Syria and Iraq in the form of bombings and other attacks by the Islamic State group.
“The EU at the moment is saying, ‘you will change your anti-terrorism law for visas,'” Erdogan said in an unusually tough speech in Istanbul.