Turkey- Turkish border province rs up security ahead of Merkel visit
Date
4/23/2016 6:52:23 PM
(MENAFN- The Journal Of Turkish Weekly) >Turkey's border province of Gaziantep ramped up security on April 23 for planned visit byGermanChancellorAngela Merkeland EU Council President Donald Tusk including a stop at a refugee camp. Uniformed and plain-clothed police officers patrolled Gaziantep city capital of the province that borders on Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL)-controlled Syrian territory and has been hit repeatedly in recent weeks by rocket fire from the other side of the frontier. Merkel along with Tusk and European Commission Vice-President Frans Timmermans were due to meet Turkish Prime MinisterAhmet Davutoluto discuss the migration crisis after visiting a refugee camp in the town of Nizip. On April 22 rockets hit Kilis to the east of Gaziantep along the Syrian border killing three and injuring four people. Merkel had been expected to visit Kilis last weekend but later the location and timing of the visit were changed. The one-day visit comes as Turkey and theEuropean Uniontry to implement a migrant returns deal withGreeceaimed at stopping migrant flows across the Aegean Sea by breaking the smugglers' business model. The legality of the deal has been called into question by rights groups. The deal coupled with border closures inEuropethat meant smugglers could not secure passage to northern European states initially slowed the numbers of new arrivals toGreecesharply. But boats have been arriving with about 150 people a day indicating the "hermetic sealing" of the route appears to be over the International Organization for Migration (IOM) said. A senior Turkish government official said the main focus of the visit by Merkel Tusk and Timmermans would be on relations with the EU and implementing the migrant deal including how to spend a promised 3 billion euros ($3.37 billion) in funding. On April 20 Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuolu said theEuropean Unionneeded to be more pragmatic in releasing the cash meant to help manage the migrant crisis saying there were problems with the delivery of the money.
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