EU-Turkey partnership: Anything but honest
The latest visit by top European Union officials to Ankara has shown that the European Union has effectively turned its back to its avowed core principles and values vis-a-vis Erdogan.
The long-awaited meeting between the highest-level European Union officials and Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was overshadowed by video footage showing EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen being humiliated by Erdogan.
A video of the leaders assembled in a meeting room in Ankara showed Erdogan and European Council President Charles Michel settling themselves into gilded chairs, while Leyen appeared unsure of where she was expected to sit. She stood staring at them, gestured with her right hand and seemed to say “um” or “ehm,” reported The Washington Post.
The video footage was widely circulated in social media by members of the European Parliament.
“‘Ehm’ is the new term for ‘that’s not how the EU-Turkey relationship should be,’” Sergey Lagodinsky, a German politician from the Green Party, tweeted.
