Merkel renews demand that Erdoğan drop Nazi comments

Chancellor Angela Merkel said on March 20 that her demand that Turkey cease drawing Nazi comparisons with Germany and its allies applies “without ifs or buts,” and pointed to a government threat last week that it could prevent Turkish politicians from entering the country, reports Turkish Hurriyet Daily.

Merkel’s comments came after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan accused her personally of “committing Nazi practices.”

Erdoğan’s comments were the latest escalation in a string of comments by Turkish officials drawing Nazi parallels with present-day Germany and the Netherlands in a dispute over restrictions on Turkish ministers campaigning there for an upcoming referendum that will decide whether the current parliamentary system should be replaced with an executive presidency.

“My comment that the Nazi comparisons on Turkey’s part must end is valid without ifs or buts,” Merkel said at a joint press conference with visiting Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe in Hannover.

“Unfortunately we see that these comparisons have not ceased, and we are not going to allow … every taboo to be broken with no regard to the suffering of those who were persecuted and murdered under Nazism,” she said.

Merkel pointed to a Foreign Ministry note sent to Turkey last week allowing Turkish referendum polling stations in Germany, in which Ankara was told that appearances by Turkish politicians must respect the principles of the German constitution, and that Berlin otherwise reserves the right to “take all necessary measures.”

Meanwhile, Merkel’s spokeswoman Ulrike Demmer deemed the Nazi comparisons as “unacceptable.”

President Erdoğan on March 19 said that “Germany’s mission was not to support terrorist organizations.”

“Merkel, now you’re applying Nazi methods against my brothers who live in Germany, and against my ministers and lawmakers who visit there. Would this suit the ethics of politics? Your mission is not to support terrorist organizations, but to extradite them,” Erdoğan said in an event in Istanbul.

On March 19, he also said Germany would like to reopen Nazi gas chambers. “If they weren’t ashamed, they would revive the gas chambers.”

Schulz also said he supports the ban on Turkish ministers who want to carry out referendum campaigns.
“There is no place in Germany for those who want to use their diplomatic immunity for making party propaganda,” he said.

German Foreign Minister Sigmar Gabriel, meanwhile, branded Erdoğan’s comments “shocking.”

“We are tolerant but we’re not stupid,” he told the Passauer Neue Presse newspaper.

“That’s why I have let my Turkish counterpart know very clearly that a boundary has been crossed here,” Gabriel said.