Kılıçdaroğlu pledges to send Syrian refugees back

ZONGULDAK

Nation Alliance’s presidential candidate and Republican People’s Party (CHP) leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu has reiterated his party’s pledge to send Syrian refugees in Türkiye back to their homeland.

“We have unemployed young people but there are 3.6 million Syrians. We will send all Syrians back to their countries within two years at the latest,” he stated on May 1 at a rally organized in the northern province of Zonguldak.

Following the start of a bloody civil war in Syria in 2011, Türkiye pursued an “open door” policy for war-battered Syrians, and it currently hosts more Syrians than any country.

Kılıçdaroğlu also said he opposed the motion voted at the parliament regarding Syria on the grounds that the text included permission for the deployment of foreign troops in Türkiye.

“It had the right to invite foreign soldiers [against] terrorist organizations to Türkiye. I never want foreign military boots in my own country. I asked [Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet] Bahçeli, [President Recep Tayyip] Erdoğan, ‘Who will you invite?’ You get up and invite foreign soldiers in the fight against terrorism,” he added.

Turkish parliament annually votes on motions to extend the military’s mandate to launch cross-border operations in Syria and Iraq. The motion was first approved in 2013 to support the international campaign against ISIL and has since been renewed annually.

He also pledged to reopen village schools if they come to power. “We will appoint 100,000. Young university graduates are unemployed, let them go to the village and work. Let the farmer win, everyone wins,” he explained.

Kılıçdaroğlu said the government imports the meat, livestock, wheat, barley and oats and pays billions of dollars. “We will turn it upside down. We will bring a humanely just order, no one should be worried,” he said.