Turkey has pressed for more money. An original EU offer of 3 billion euros for refugee care over two years is now likely not to carry a clear timeframe as Ankara hopes to secure more.
Leaders of the European Union
aim to sign an agreement with Turkey in Brussels on Sunday that offers
Ankara cash and closer ties with the EU in return for Turkish help in
stemming the flow of migrants to Europe.
Aware of a
sense of desperation in Europe for a solution to a crisis that is
tearing the bloc apart following the arrival of close to a million
people this year, Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has been driving a hard bargain and diplomats said the 28 states had struggled through Saturday to agree a final offer.
Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu is due to meet the 28 EU national leaders for three hours from 4 p.m. (1500 GMT).
The Europeans, and none more so than German Chancellor Angela Merkel,
are under pressure to manage the biggest influx of people since World
War Two, the bulk of them to Germany, where Merkel is pushing hard for a
Turkish deal. The crisis has helped populist opponents and set nations
against each other, straining the open borders cherished by the Union's
members.
Measures the EU has taken in recent
months have as yet done little to control movements and while winter
weather may lower the numbers for a few months, it is also worsening the
plight of tens of thousands stuck by closing borders in the Balkans,
piling further pressure on European leaders to find a solution.
Sunday's
summit, called just days ago as Brussels tried to clinch a deal offered
over a month ago, has been complicated by Turkey's downing of a Russian
warplane on the Syrian border.
That has in turn
complicated European efforts to re-engage with Moscow, despite a
continued frost over Ukraine, in order to try and advance a peace in
Syria that could both end the flight of refugees and contain Islamic
State. The Islamist group's attack on Paris two weeks ago has also
heightened public calls in the EU for more controls on people arriving
from Syria.
By late on Saturday, after a further
meeting of EU envoys in Brussels, diplomats said a common EU offer that
they hope will secure Davutoglu's signature was agreed. It should be
approved by governments on Sunday before the summit.
There
remains a degree of nervousness, however, that Turkey could hold out
for more - a nervousness heightened by Erdogan's decision not to attend
himself but to send his prime minister.
"The Turks always negotiate to the last second," one senior EU diplomat said. "Why should this time be different?"
CASH ON TABLE
Europeans
want Turkey to spend new EU money - some 3 billion euros (£2.13
billion) for the next year or two - on improving life for the 2.3
million Syrians now living in Turkey so that they are less likely to
take to boats for nearby Greek islands.
The EU
also wants Turkish authorities to make that journey more difficult and
to keep out more of the Afghans and other Asians who cross Turkey on
their way to Europe. It also wants to hold Turkey to commitments to take
back people who successfully reach Greece but then fail in their claims
for political asylum.
Turkey has pressed for more
money. An original EU offer of 3 billion euros for refugee care over
two years is now likely not to carry a clear timeframe as Ankara hopes
to secure more.
Turks will be promised easier travel visas for Europe if they fulfil commitments on migrant flows in the coming year.
It
will also win a pledge of "re-energised" talks on joining the EU,
though with conditions to persuade EU states that do not want populous,
Muslim Turkey ever to join, and also Cyprus, which wants Ankara first to
help it reunite the island.
Diplomats said
Turkey, whose decade-old EU accession talks have been stalled, would see
talks on economic cooperation open shortly, but its demands for
commitments from the EU to start talks on other issues such as human
rights would remain on hold - satisfying Cypriot insistence it meet
existing conditions.
Human rights concerns are
unlikely to feature much in the talks on Sunday, diplomats said, despite
calls from activists in Europe and Turkey for EU leaders not to ease
pressure on Erdogan over issues such as media freedom because of the
migrant crisis.
While EU leaders have pledged to
continue to raise issues such as last week's new jailing of Turkish
journalists and new complaints of oppression from minority Kurds,
officials and diplomats say Europe's priority with Ankara for now will
be getting Erdogan's help in slowing migrant movements.
A
senior German official stressed on Friday, however, that Ankara also
had much to gain from cooperation as it faces an angry Russia and
hostility from Syria and Iran.
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