Turkey hosts more than 4 million refugees, of whom 3.7 million are Syrian. This is a very big number. With the growing economic and social problems, the situation with the refugees has become more difficult. It is not specific to Turkey as any country facing such big demographic movements in a short time faced and will continue to face such problems.
However, although the problems have been tough from the beginning, Turkey has always welcomed the people in need. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s government has opened its doors to people trying to save their lives while most of the European countries closed borders and restricted refugee policies.
Even two weeks ago, we saw how Greek forces forcibly pushed some 94 Syrian refugees, 30 of whom were children, trapped in an islet in the Maritsa (Meriç) River between Turkey and Greece.
There have been many incidents, such as in Hungary and Greece, in particular in the last 11 years like that. Most of the European states have been quite intolerant of people seeking shelter. That is the main reason why Turkey is left with such high numbers of immigrants.
That is why I find it rather unfair for Ankara to be blamed by Athens for bad behavior toward the Syrian refugees. Turkey should keep being friendly to refugees in need and if it changes its policy, it would be wrong but Greece has not been following a refugee-friendly policy at all and yet criticizing Ankara about this raises question marks.
Erdoğan recently said in a video message for the Global Parliamentary Conference on migration, “In fact, countries like us, which are neighbors to the crisis areas, bear the real burden on the issue of migration and refugees, the developed countries who raise high voices not bear that burden.”
Although it is difficult to absorb so many people, this should not justify the growing hatred toward the immigrants. In Turkey, the far-right extremists in the opposition like the Victory Party (ZP) headed by the academic Ümit Özdağ try to demonize the refugees, which is like playing with fire.
They create imaginary horrible scenarios, depicting in the near future a Turkey populated more by Syrians rather than Turks and having real security issues created by those immigrants.
These horror stories do not reflect the facts. The criminal records show that immigrants are not keener to being engaged in criminal activity; on the contrary, their percentage in police records is lower than the average.
This is why Erdoğan’s words at the recent conference were very important and meaningful. He stated that they observed that economic difficulties fueled xenophobia and hostility toward immigrants all over the world during the pandemic. He added: “Simultaneously, with the economic crisis triggered by the pandemic, more and more people are forced to leave their lands and homes. Currently, the number of migrants worldwide has reached 275 million, the displaced persons are approaching 85 million, and the number of refugees is 30 million. With the ongoing conflicts between Russia and Ukraine, 5 million have been added to the current number of refugees.”
These numbers are scary. Humanity should find ways to be more tolerant and care about those people in need. Turkey has always been a good example of that. We should not be poisoned by the hate speech of some politicians. This global crisis needs global solutions. We should be united against xenophobia and discrimination.
