“We are holding talks with Turkey. ... They are moving forward, not very quickly, but they are moving forward,” Malmström, who since Feb. 10 has been the EU’s home affairs commissioner and is also responsible for migration, was quoted as saying on Wednesday by German press agency Deutsche Presse-Agentur (dpa).
“I count on going to Turkey soon,” Malmström, a Swedish politician familiar with Turkey since she was her country’s minister for European Union affairs for four years before taking up her current post, said, while noting that the country is an important partner in the migration debate.
Tens of thousands of illegal migrants are believed to enter Europe via Turkey. Turkish authorities apprehended approximately 65,000 illegal migrants in 2008. A re-admission agreement under discussion between Turkish and EU officials envisages sending migrants back to their countries of origin via Turkey.
The EU and Turkey have long been at odds over this critical issue. The EU alleges that Turkey is not doing enough to tackle illegal migration coming from the East, especially from Afghanistan, Pakistan and the Middle East, claiming that the country has failed to fulfill its promises to repatriate illegal migrants who pass through Turkey and are later detained in EU member states. Turkey, on the other hand, needs the assistance of the EU to establish a reliable system and to ease worries about whether all detained migrants will be sent back after the agreement is signed.
