Ruling AKP slams French President Macron over his Turkey remarks

ANKARA – Anadolu Agency

The ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) on Aug. 29 criticized French President Emmanuel Macron for his remarks on Turkey and its EU membership process.

We want to hear a commonsense statement from Macron on Turkey and we would also like to remind Macron how inconvenient it is to mix Islam and terror,” party spokesperson Ömer Çelik said at a news conference following the AKP’s central executive board meeting.

During the Ambassadors Conference in Paris on Aug. 27, Macron said “to fight Islamist terrorism, we created a new law in France.”

Macron also questioned Turkey’s EU membership.

“Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has a pan-Islamic project that is contrary to our European values,” the French president had said.

Macron said there was a need to build a strategic partnership with Turkey instead of granting it EU membership.

“We need to build a strategic partnership with Russia and Turkey because they are two important powers for our collective security; they must be tied to Europe,” he said.

“President Erdoğan’s Turkey is not President Mustafa Kemal Atatürk’s Turkey anymore,” he added.

Referring to a plan by Dutch anti-Islam politician Geert Wilders to hold a Prophet Muhammad cartoon competition, Çelik said “such provocative attacks cause these racists and fascists to gain a place in European politics.”

“Europe’s Daesh [ISIL] are its far-right parties…There is no difference between the leaders of the Daesh terrorist group and fascists like Dutch far-right leader Wilders,” he said.

“Therefore, if they are taking measures against Daesh, they must take such measures against these racists. This is not something to be evaluated in the context of freedom of thought,” he added.

Wilders’ anti-Islam Party for Freedom had previously called for the Quran to be banned.