January 8, 2018 | Quoted by Thomas Seibert - The Arab Weekly
In tactical turnaround, Erdogan rediscovers ‘old friends’ in Europe
Just a few months ago, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan compared European leaders to Nazis and condemned them as Islamophobes but when he recently talked about his EU colleagues, Erdogan referred to them as his “old friends.”
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Ankara seeks political and economic rewards with the shift but could easily revert to its harsher approach should the need arise, they point out. Aykan Erdemir, a senior fellow at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a Washington think-tank, and a former Turkish lawmaker, said it is significant that Turkey does not make a new start with the European Union as a whole but with individual members.
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