EU-Turkey Statement

stresses that this is a long-term framework that can evolve and change over time. In an annex to ¹⁸⁴ the MP, 10 initial proposed initiatives on how to achieve the goals are set out. ¹⁸⁵

and Turkey. When Turkey applied for membership in the 1950s, migration between the two actors was mostly in the form of Turkish migrants moving to EU territory. However, the end of the Cold War as well as unrest in the Middle East, near Turkish borders meant that Turkey went from being mostly a migrant sending country to suddenly having to deal with large numbers of incoming migrants. Turkey’s existing migration policies at the time were not fit for dealing with incoming migrants and thus needed updating. Currently, Turkey is a migrant sending, transit and receiving ¹⁹⁰ country. Being at the EU’s borders, this means that EU-Turkey relations have largely revolved around migration since the 1990s. Since Turkey is a candidate country the EU started pressuring ¹⁹¹ Turkey to reform their migration and asylum policies in line with EU norms and standards. On the one hand, between 1994 and 2011 Turkey reformed old migration policies and created new ones in line with the EU. Since 2010 the EU and Turkey have been working together on combating irregular migration and on creating systems to accommodate incoming asylum seekers. On the ¹⁹² other hand, the EU demanded from Turkey support on border control, adoption of the EU’s visa policy, a Readmission Agreement and the abolishment of the Turkish geographical limitation to the Geneva Convention (1951). Other than the visa policy, Turkey did not comply with any of these ¹⁹³ demands and as the visa policy changed in the EU in 2005, Turkey did not change theirs in order to comply again, rather moving to reverse their initial compliance with the policy by 2009. ¹⁹⁴ Interestingly, the more Turkey worked on complying with EU standards, the more critical of the EU Turkey became. Turkey found the EU to be self-centred, too focussed on security and felt itself being used as a buffer zone against irregular migration. ¹⁹⁵

In 2011, with the start of mass migration from Syria, EU-Turkey relations shifted again. For Turkey it meant a functioning migration policy was imperative. Thus, in 2013 a Readmission Agreement (EUTRA) was finally signed with the EU. It also gave Turkey an important piece of leverage against the EU. Where the EU was very used to using conditionality in relationships with third countries, in this case, Turkey could impose conditionality on the EU. This is because it was instrumental for the EU that Turkey did not let too many Syrian asylum seekers through to the EU.

190. Tolay, 42.

191. Ahmet İçduygu and Ayşem Biriz Karaçay, “Demography and migration in transition: Reflections on EU-Turkey relations," in EU-Turkey, Migration and the EU: Potentials, Challenges and Opportunities, eds. Seçil Paçaci Elitok and Thomas Straubhaar (Hamburg: Hamburg University Press, 2012), 23, https://doi.org/10.15460/HUP.HWWI.5.118.

192. Tolay, 43-45; 47.

193. Gökalp Aras, 51.

194. Tolay, 45.

195. Gökalp Aras, 53.

The Joint Action Plan, signed November 2015 and aimed at ordering migratory flows and containing irregular migration, underscored Turkey’s new leverage. Under the JAP Turkey constructed a wall along its border with Syria giving it the literal possibility to open and close the border for Syrian asylum seekers on their way to Europe. As high numbers of migrants continued ¹⁹⁶ to cross the Turkish border into Greece, even with the wall in place, the EU and Turkey got to negotiating the EU-Turkey Statement.

4.2.2 The EU-Turkey Statement

The EU-Turkey Statement is the final result of a series of talks between the EU and Turkey from November 2015 to March 2016. In this period the Joint Action Plan was also agreed upon between the partners. However, where the JAP mostly focused on border control, the Statement took this a step further with its relocation scheme. Unlike the Moldova MP, the EU-Turkey Statement is not ¹⁹⁷ a large document with a multitude of goals and ideas for its implementation. The Statement was only published in the form of a press release by the European Council. Additionally, the Statement is explicitly a “temporary and extraordinary measure”, and is only 9 articles long. The first two ¹⁹⁸ articles sets out what the Statement is infamous for: “All new irregular migrants crossing from Turkey into Greek Islands as from 20 March 2016 will be returned to Turkey,” and “For every ¹⁹⁹ Syrian being returned to Turkey from Greek Islands, another Syrian will be resettled from Turkey to the EU.” Both articles go on to define the conditions for the resettlements. Article 3 reaffirms ²⁰⁰ Turkey’s commitment to border security and article 4 outlines what should happen once irregular crossings between Turkey and Greece have significantly slowed, namely that another scheme will activate to deal with the border crossings. Articles 5 through 9 delineate the EU’s commitments to closer cooperation: an additional 3 billion euro on top of an earlier promised 3 billion euro for Turkey to deal with returning migrants, visa liberation talks, a re-energised accession process toward Turkey and joint actions on the Turkish-Syrian border to improve living conditions of fleeing Syrians. ²⁰¹

196. Gökalp Aras, 55.

197. Roman Lehner, “The EU-Turkey-’deal’: Legal Challenges and Pitfalls,” International Migration 57, no. 2 (2019): 177.

198. European Council, “EU-Turkey Statement.”

199. European Council, “EU-Turkey Statement.”

200. European Council, “EU-Turkey Statement.”

201. European Council, “EU-Turkey Statement.”

Understanding EU-Moldova and EU-Turkey relations as well as the content of the Moldova MP and the EU-Turkey Statement now means I can move on to comparing these two agreements.

4.3 Comparing the Moldova MP and the EU-Turkey Statement