The Turkish government has granted citizenship to over 1.4 million Syrian migrants, seven times the amount announced by Ankara, Ümit Özdağ, the leader for far-right anti-immigration Victory Party said on Saturday, Diken news site reported.
A total of 1,476,368 Syrian nationals living in Turkey – almost a third of the entire demographic – has been naturalized, as opposed to the some 200,000 claimed by Ankara, the opposition leader said, citing what he called official documentation.
Turkish Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu, during a TV programme earlier this week, said that 211,000 of Turkey’s some 3.7 million Syrian migrants had been granted Turkish citizenship, of which 120,000 would be voting in the upcoming elections slated for next year, according to Diken.
Turkey is home to the largest Syrian migrant community in the world. The question of granting citizenship to refugees from Syria is a controversial issue in country, particularly as the presidential and parliamentary elections draw near. The Turkish opposition has accused President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of naturalizing the asylum seekers in a bid to allow them to vote in order to keep his post as president.
The figures provided by Ankara are “‘incorrect,” the leader of the Victory Party, known for his anti-immigrant statements, said, adding a total of 13 million people in the country of 86 million were living as “refugees” or “illegally” in the country.
Özdağ said that the data he was providing was based on state documents and cross referenced from multiple sources.
“There is zero chance that it is incorrect,’’ he said.
Özdağ made headlines last year, after he commissioned a short film, “Silent Invasion”, which effectively accused Syrian migrants of the current economic crisis, among other matters. The Victory Party leader frequently targets migrants and strongly supports their repatriation into the war–torn country.
Turkish law by default does not classify Syrians living in Turkey as refugees, which complicates their legal status. A signatory to the 1951 Refugee Convention of the United Nations since 1962, the Turkish government joined the convention on the condition that the agreement applies solely to refugees fleeing Europe. Turkey recognizes Syrian refugees, who began arriving in Turkey in 2011, as a group rather than as individual refugees. Ankara passed specific laws relating to a special “Syrian” status.
Ahval