THE EU-TURKEY STATEMENT (MIGRATION DEAL) IN

TURKEY-EU RELATIONS
• Readmission -Act by a State accepting the re-entry of an individual (own national,
national of another State – most commonly a person who had previously transited
through the country or a permanent resident – or a stateless person) (UN IOM,
2019)
• Readmission Agreement – A bilateral or multilateral agreement between States
that establishes, in a reciprocal manner, the basis and procedures, for one State to
promptly and orderly return non-nationals, who do not or no longer fulfil the
conditions for entry or stay on its territory, to their home State or a third State,
most commonly a State through which they have transited or a State in which they
had permanent residence (UN IOM, 2019)

RAs articulate jointly agreed-upon procedures for the return of irregular migrants,
failed asylum seekers and those no longer in need of international protection
• The EU uses readmission agreements (RAs) as one of the oldest
elements to control migration.
• Council Recommendation (1994) concerning a specimen bilateral
readmission agreement between a m-s and a third country
• After 9/11 terrorist attacks, the fight against terrorism, organised
crime, «illegal immigration» became a priority for the EU.
Readmission&return is an «essential tool» of the fight against illegal
immigration (Council of the EU, 2011) thus RAs have gained more
importance.
• The EU exerted pressure on Turkey to sign a RA as Turkey is a transit
country which irregular migrants use to get to Europe.
• After a lengthy and difficult negotiation process with ups and downs,* the Readmission
Agreement was finally signed b/w Turkey and the EU on December 16, 2013, ratified by the Grand
National Assembly on 25 June 2014 and went into force on 1 October 2014.**
• According to the RA, Turkey shall readmit, … , all persons who do not or who no longer, fulfil the
conditions in force under the law of that Member State or under the law of the Union for entry to,
presence in, or residence on, the territory of the requesting Member State provided that in
accordance with Article 9,*** they are nationals of Turkey (Art. 3(1) – readmission of own
nationals)
• Turkey shall readmit, … , all third-country nationals or stateless persons who do not, or who no
longer, fulfil the conditions in force for entry to, presence in, or residence on, the territory of the
requesting Member State provided that in accordance with Article 10*** they are third-country
nationals and stateless persons (Art. 4 (1) – readmission of third-country nationals and stateless
persons)
Turkey was not required to readmit all third-country nationals or stateless persons who have
entered or were staying irregularly in the EU territory, until October 2017.

The RA signed w/EU was an important step towards a visa liberalisation, since it is part of the
Roadmap for a visa-free regime. On the signing day of the RA, Turkey and the EU launched a
dialogue on visa liberalisation.
• Visa Liberalisation Roadmap– the basis of visa liberalisation process
initiated in parallel with the signature of the RA (within the broader
dialogue and cooperation framework between the EU and its
Member States and Turkey in Justice and Home Affairs matters);
identifies the areas where Turkey will have to undertake legislative
and administrative reforms with a view to establishing a secure
environment for visa-free travel – the areas are
Documents security
Migration and border management
Public order and security
Fundamental rights
Readmission of irregular migrants
• 2015 - over a million irregular migrants and
refugees arrived in Europe mostly from Syria,
Africa and South Asia; with 3,771 deaths, it was
the deadliest year on record for migrants and
refugees crossing the Mediterranean trying to
reach Europe (IOM, Dec 2015)
• Turkey – hosting, for the second time, the world's
largest number of refugees fleeing mainly from the
conflict in Syria
• 880.000 passed from Turkey to Greece in this
period (Eur Commission, 2016)

The arrival of refugees in big numbers was regarded

as «refugee crisis»by the European countries in
summer 2015** and in the last quarter of the year
the EU member-states started negotiations w/Turkey
to manage «the crisis» and control migration.
• 15 Oct 2015 – Joint Action Plan to step up cooperation b/w Turkey&EU on
support of Syrians under temporary protection and migration management*
• 12 Nov 2015 - EU officials announced an agreement to offer Turkey 3 billion
euros over two years to manage more than 2 million refugees from Syria in
return for curbing migration through Turkey into the EU
• 24 Nov 2015 – European Commission decided on preparing FRIT (Facility for
Refugees in Turkey)
• 29 Nov 2015 – it was decided to launch JAP but according to Amnesty Int’l,
the Plan did not reduce irregular migration flows as targeted so the EU
needed a more comprehensive solution** (the numbers remained high in
early 2016)
• Starting on 7 March 2016, the EU met with Turkey for another
summit in Brussels to negotiate further solutions of the crisis. In the
meeting, the EU proposed to the Turkish government a plan in which
Turkey would take back every refugee who entered Greece (and
thereby the EU) illegally. In return, the EU would accept one person
into the EU who is registered as a Syrian refugee in Turkey for every
Syrian sent back from Greece. Turkey countered the offer by
demanding a further 3 billion Euros in order to help them in supplying
the 2.7 million refugees in Turkey. In addition, the Turkish government
asked for their citizens to be allowed to travel freely into the
Schengen area starting at the end of June 2016, as well as an
increased speed in talks of a possible accession of Turkey to the
European Union.
• 17-18 March 2016 – The third
Summit was held where the EU
leaders met with their Turkish
counterpart, Prime Minister Ahmed
Davutoğlu. They reached an
agreement – officially known as EU-
Turkey Statement – aimed at
stopping the flow of irregular
migration via Turkey to Europe,
breaking the business model of
smugglers and offering migrants an
alternative to putting their lives at
risk.
• 20 March – The Deal came into effect.
Acc. to the Deal, migrants arriving in
Greece will be sent back to Turkey if they
do not apply for asylum or their claim is
rejected. The Deal further outlines the
mechanism that any irregular migrants
who will cross into Greece from Turkey
after 20 March 2016, will be sent back to
Turkey based on individual case by case
evaluation. Any Syrian who is returned to
Turkey will be replaced by a Syrian
resettled from Turkey to the EU (1:1
formula), preferably the individuals who
did not try to enter the EU illegally in the
past and not exceeding a maximum of
72,000 people.
• The EU will, in close cooperation with Turkey,
further speed up the disbursement of the initially
allocated €3 billion under the FRIT. Once these
resources are about to be used in full, the EU will
mobilise additional funding for the Facility up to an
additional €3 billion by the end of 2018.
• EU leaders and Turkey also agreed to accelerate
the fulfilment of the visa liberalisation roadmap,
with a view to lifting visa requirements for Turkish
citizens by end of June 2016 at the latest, if all
benchmarks have been met.** They reconfirmed
their commitment to re-energise the accession
process as set out in the joint statement of 29
November 2015. They agreed, as a next step, to
open chapter 33 during the Netherlands
presidency.

For the EU, the EU-Turkey Statement is very

important since it provides the overall framework for
the EU-Turkey cooperation on migration.
 2016-2023 : What happened in 7 years?
• As stated in the European Commission’s Joint
Communication to the European Council (2021),
the number of irregular crossings from Turkey to
Greece substantially declined.* Even though
tragic incidents continued, the number of lives
lost in the Aegean Sea has significantly
decreased. The returns remained on a slow
pace, like in the previous years. Due to Covid-19
restrictions, returns were suspended.** Only
2140 irregular migrants and asylum seekers were
returned to Turkey, while 28300 Syrian refugees
were resettled from Turkey to the EU.***

Source: UNHCR, “Operational Portal: Refugee Situations,

Mediterranean Situation, Greece,”
• Throughout the process, political tensions between Turkey and the EU
have at times led to the questioning of «the Deal’s fate». Tensions
b/w the sides were mostly about the issue of visa liberalization and
the financial aspects. In this context, there were official statements
such as «We will open the doors!»(Sputnik Türkiye, 05 Sept 2019) and
«The Readmission Agreement has been suspended» (Daily Sabah, 23
July 2019) on several occasions.
• Tensions reached its peak as the
Turkish government, following the
Idlib offensive in late February 2020,
announced that it would not stop
Syrian refugees from reaching Europe
«by land or sea» and that police and
board guards had been stood down.
Migrants, heading towards the Greek
border after the announcement, were
unable to cross into Greece as the
Greek authorities increased border
security and the migrants were
trapped in the buffer zone between
Tr&Gr (GAR, 2020).
• The Covid-19 pandemic affected the process, as well. In mid-March
2020, due to the pandemic conditions, Germany announced the
suspension of its resettlement programme for asylum-seekers coming
from Turkey (Diken, 18 March 2020). Pazarkule Border Crossing point
was closed and the migrants were transported to other cities by
buses organised by Directorate General for Migration Management.
Approximately 4,500 migrants were moved from Edirne and taken to
a camp in Osmaniye where they were kept in quarantine for 14 days
(Sözcü, 27 March 2020). The pandemic has deeply affected the living
conditions of migrants, increasing their vulnerability and reducing
their visibility (tech4refugeewoman, 2020). Due to poor conditions in
camps, the vulnerability of migrants even more increased.*
• 17 December 2020 - Head of the EU Delegation to Turkey Ambassador
Meyer-Landrut announced that the EU concluded 6 billion Euro
contract for refugees in Turkey and that it would be ready to continue
its financial assistance to Syrian refugees and the host societies
• 23 December 2020 – The European Commission announced that
assistance would continue to support humanitarian actions in Turkey
outside the FRIT. This included EUR 485 million under an Amending
Budget to continue the Emergency Social Safety Net (ESSN) and the
Conditional Cash Transfer for Education (CCTE). The assistance would
continue until early 2022.
• The EU-Turkey Statement has been considered a
success especially by the EU. However, it was
criticised by NGOs and human rights groups on the
grounds that the Deal violated international law and
refugee rights. In terms of violation of rights, 2
aspects are underlined:
a) Due to long asylum procedures, migrants are
stuck in the Greek islands and forced to live in
rather inhumane conditions in the camps known
as «Europe’s Guantanamo bay» (Choose Love, 5
Apr 2018)
b) It is criticised that Turkey was recognised as a safe
third country where migrants may return. The
lack of access to effective protection for asylum-
seekers in Turkey is the main reason behind this
criticism.* Another one is the claims that Turkey
has violated the principle of non-refoulement, as
reported by Amnesty International and Human
Rights Watch.
• The Migrant Deal was also criticised on the
grounds that considering the reduction in the
number of irregular entries to the EU territory
as a success overshadowed the negative
situation caused by the Deal and the EU’s
restrictive migration policies. In this context, it
was underlined that the Deal based on the
deterrence of returns, turned high return rates
into an indicator of successful border policies
and it prioritised border security over the
protection of human rights (Alpes, Tunaboylu
and van Liempt, 2019).
• The EU was criticised on the grounds that the
Member-states did not fulfill the obligations
deriving from the 1951 UN Refugee
Convention and disregarded refugee and
migrant rights (Gatti, 2016; Carrera et al.
2017).
The Migrant/Refugee Deal has important dimensions:
 Political dimension – The Deal is considered as the most important
chapter in EU-Turkey relations which had hit a low with the Eastern
Mediterranean crisis starting in 2018, the situation in early March 2020
in Pazarkule Border Crossing point as a result of the «unblocking»
migrants' attempt to cross the Greek border and the international
boycott campaign against Macron launched in October 2020 (Nas,
2020). Indeed, on its 5th anniversary, despite the different motivations
of the parties, bureaucrats and politicians on both the EU and Turkish
side agreed that the Deal should be maintained (Danış, 2021).*
 Legal and refugee rights dimension - The most important legal impact of the
agreement was the break in human rights law. Although publicly referred to as
an «agreement», the Deal is a non-binding political declaration that does not
create any mutual responsibilities and obligations for the parties (Danış, 2021).
As Dr. Övünç Öztürk notes, since the Statement is not an international
agreement it cannot be regulated and this is actually the main problem. The
fact that this political declaration is declared by the member states instead of
the EU means that it is not subject to EU law thus the EU judicial bodies do not
have the competence to regulate this political declaration. 2016 EU-Turkey
Statement has been an «informal tool» which cannot be regulated (Danış,
2021).
The other aspect concerning refugee rights is related to the «safe third country».
Some law scholars and legal experts say that Turkey cannot be considered a safe
third country due to the fact that Syrians under temporary protection do not
have access to international protection acquired by refugee status.
• There have been problems in the implementation of «the Deal».
One of the problems directly affecting Turkey and refugees is that
the EU countries did not even resettle half the number of Syrians
they had promised in accordance with the 1:1 formula. ESI
coordinator Dr. Knaus, one of the advocates of «the Deal» notes that
this was caused by the anti-immigration policies of countries like
Hungary which refuses to share the burden regarding refugees,
while Prof. Dr. Chatty criticizes the EU’s failure to impose sanctions
on the member-states which refuse to accept refugees. Lastly, it is to
be emphasised that the Syrian refugees, who were mostly affected
by the Deal, have not been included in any decision-making process
at any stage.
• Perhaps the only positive impact of the Refugee Deal is the financial
assistance provided for the Syrian refugees (FRIT). FRIT funding has made
significant contributions, particularly in the areas of health and education.
Prior to the agreement, only one fifth of Syrian children in Turkey received
formal education but with PIKTES (Promoting Inclusive Education for Kids in
the Turkish Education System), which was put into practice thanks to this
fund, the rate exceeded 65%. Likewise, the SIHHAT project, supported by
FRIT funding, contributed to opening of migrant centres providing health
services to Syrians. Apart from those, integration projects were launched in
many fields including employment (Danış, 2021).
• One of the important results of the Deal is the de facto continuation of
temporary protection status given to Syrians who cannot get refugee status
because of the geographical limitation Turkey has put to the UN Refugee
Convention of 1951. The uncertainty in the Syrian’s status in Turkey makes
their integration difficult (Danış, 2021).