ML-Implode News - Merkel Refugee Deal with Turkey in Danger of Failure

... no one aside from the German chancellor appears to have much interest in the agreement anymore. Erdogan certainly doesn't: He does not want to make any concessions on his country's expansive anti-terror laws, the reform of which is one of a long list of conditions Turkey must meet before the EU will grant visa freedoms. The Europeans at large, wary of selling out their values to the autocrat in Ankara, are also deeply skeptical. And in Germany, Merkel's junior coalition partners, the center-left Social Democrats (SPD), have seized on the deal as a way to finally score some much needed political points against the powerful chancellor. Even within Merkel's own conservatives, many are seeing the troubles the deal is facing as an opportunity to break with the chancellor's disliked refugee policies.
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The SPD's skepticism initially became apparent during the April scandal surrounding the insulting poem broadcast by comedian Jan BÃ¶hmermann on German public television. The poem was deeply disrespectful of Erdogan, which led the Turkish president to file a legal complaint against BÃ¶hmermann under an anachronistic German law that forbids the insulting of foreign dignitaries. Complaints filed under the law require the approval of the chancellor to go ahead, and Merkel -- controversially -- gave the green light. The mood in the SPD has turned against Erdogan as a consequence of the pressure he has exerted against media outlets and journalists in Turkey as well as his fight against the Kurds and the human rights violations that have taken place in Turkey. SPD members of parliament have been particularly outspoken. "Our credibility is at stake," says Niels Annen, the SPD expert for foreign policy issues in parliament. "Compromises are fine, but we will not sacrifice our credibility."

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Merkel Refugee Deal with Turkey in Danger of Failure