World Bulletin / News Desk

The safety of Europe, prestige of NATO and protection of the EU starts on Turkey’s border, according to Union of European Turkish Democrats (UETD) head Zafer Sirakaya Wednesday.

“Europe’s safety, NATO’s prestige and border, and protection of the EU values starts on Turkey’s border,” he said.

He also highlighted that Turkey is fighting against terrorism in Syria’s Afrin via Operation Olive Branch, which was launched on Saturday to eradicate PYD/PKK and ISIL terrorists from the region.

Sirakaya criticized the Western media for portraying the operation as targeting the Kurdish society.

“Turkey is a country which embraced around 200,000 Kurdish-origin brothers from Kobani [Ayn al-Arab in Arabic] in a day,” he said.

Due to the civil war in their country, many Syrian Kurdish families fled to Turkey, fearing the return to their homeland.

Nearly 350,000 Kurds from Afrin, Syria, left their country, and most of them fled to Turkey after oppression from the terrorist groups, PKK/PYD/YPG and ISIL.

Sirakaya said economic, social and political instability in the Middle East forced people to find refuge, causing a wave of migration; Turkey today hosts around 3.5 million refugees.

Terrorist organizations in Syria do not differentiate between Arabs, Kurds and Turkmens; they want to destroy everyone who does not think the way they do, he said, adding that when such organizations cannot destroy, they force people to migrate.

“If terrorism in Syria is not cleared, a new wave of migration will occur,” he warned.

He also said if one wishes to control the spate of racist attacks in Europe, it is necessary to coordinate on migration-related issues.

“We saw how Europe lost control with a migration wave of one million people.”