Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said he does not believe the European Union will impose sanctions on Turkey for its dispute with Greece over territorial claims in the eastern Mediterranean Sea, hinting that should it do so, Turkey could unleash millions of migrants on Europe. “We made the decision not to prevent migrants from going to Europe and this decision is still valid,” Cavusoglu told the pro-government NTV news channel today.
Cavusoglu repeated Ankara’s claims that it was France, Greece and Greek Cyprus who were pushing for sanctions that are set to be weighed at a meeting of the EU Council of Ministers on Sept. 24-25 in Brussels. Cavusoglu said that Ankara had succeeded in making the EU see reason. “As we explained ourselves, EU members came to realize that we were right,” Cavusoglu claimed. Recent developments, however, suggest the opposite: that faced with the threat of EU sanctions and rumblings of discontent from Washington, it's Ankara that’s backing down.