Turkey renews call for Syria no-fly zone

Turkey wants world leaders to discuss the conflicts in Syria and Iraq at a G20 summit this weekend and is ready to take “stronger steps” in the region following its general election, President Tayyip Erdogan said today.

“It is about … an EU-Turkey summit to demonstrate that we will work very closely with each other and that we sensibly share out the challenges that have arisen from the civil war in Syria and the hard situations in other countries”, Merkel told reporters. Tusk was “99 percent sure” it would be at the end of November. In return, Ankara pledged to do its best to curb the influx of asylum seekers crossing its borders to reach Europe.

Though Turkish officials play down its importance, European diplomats say organising a summit-level platform for Erdogan to meet his EU counterparts has been an important element in talks.

Turkey is also expected to use its presidency of the G20 to try to persuade allies including Washington against giving USA allied Syrian Kurdish rebels a greater role in the fight against Islamic State militants. A few have insisted in recent days that they would only agree to an EU-Turkey summit once an accord was fully negotiated.

Turkey is host to more than 2 million refugees from Syria.

Of that, 500 million euros would come from the European Union budget and the rest, under the Commission proposal, from the 28 member states according to their national incomes. Merkel said that precise budgeting was yet to be done and diplomats said several governments had reservations about contributing.

Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said on Tuesday that Turkey would respond by air and land to threats from Syria and that a new strategy was needed in the country.

EU Council President Donald Tusk also confirmed plans for a summit before the end of the year.

“Saving Schengen is a race against time”, the former Polish premier said of the open border system among European states. “And we are determined to win that race”.