'Syrians in Turkey got chance to return to school'

By Yusuf Hatip

BRUSSELS

Syrian children in Turkey brought back to school is of the most important parts of the EU-Turkey cooperation, said the European commissioner for humanitarian aid and crisis management.

“I’m very proud as European commissioner of this big achievement to implement EU-Turkey facility. Because the EU and Turkish people, we managed to reach a lot of Syrian refugees and in particular, children to bring back to school," Christos Stylianides told Anadolu Agency on Tuesday in Brussels following his visit to Turkey.

“And this is for me the most important thing in our cooperation,” he added.

On Monday, Stylianides paid a visit to Turkey during which he met the country's vice president and discussed Turkey’s EU membership process as well as the global migration problem, in particular the Syrians in Turkey and EU fund allocated for them.

In March 2016, EU and Turkey reached an agreement to stop irregular migration through the Aegean Sea and improve the conditions of Syrian refugees in Turkey.

Stylianides said during his visit he “talked everything about humanitarian assistance in Turkey.”

Turkish NGOs playing important role

Also speaking at the Faces of Turkey: Civil Society event, Stylianides said Turkey hosts around 4 million Syrians and over 1.5 million of them are children.

He said Turkish non-governmental organizations were playing an important role in distributing humanitarian aid to Syrians.

He also underlined that the EU and Turkey were going to keep working together to help people in need.

Membership process should be used as tool to improve relations

Miltiadis Kyrkos, member of the European Parliament (EP), told Anadolu Agency that the motive behind organizing the event was to show Europeans that Turkey is a multifaceted society and that these sides of the country were at the level of envy.

Kyrkos opened the exhibition at the EP in Brussels, where stalls of the Turkish NGOs will be at the event from Jan. 8 to 11.

He further pointed out the importance of cooperation between Europe and Turkey.

If we mention some issues between Turkey and the EU, we should use the membership process as a tool to improve our relations, Kyrkos added.