German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble rejected calls from his country’s opposition, earlier this week, to halt cooperation with Turkey over its crackdown on those allegedly responsible for last months’ coup attempt, saying Berlin needed to continue working with Ankara on the migrant issue.
Schaeuble, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel’s conservative Christian Democratic Union, said it was important to continue working with Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan to ensure his help in dealing with a flood of refugees into Europe from countries like Syria, Iraq; “And so, I don’t like what (Turkish president) Erdogan is doing, not at all. But I do not think – as many do now at the Greens or Social-democrats or Left Party – that we need to discontinue the cooperation with Erdogan. No. We rely on working together and safeguard our interest, our responsibilities, and that means a reasonable cooperation with your neighbors, whether you like then or not. And any alternative is worse. That is the policy of the CDU,” said Schaeuble.