EU to seek summit with Turkey in the next months

The president of the European Union said the 28-nation bloc will be seeking to hold a summit meeting with Turkey in the coming months to discuss the strained relations between the two.

"We have a mandate to organize this kind of summit in the next months," EU Council President Donald Tusk was quoted as saying by state-run Anadolu Agency late Dec. 15, adding that no date had been set yet. 

"Today we discussed about this possible summit between our [EU] institutions and authorities of Turkey," Tusk said, speaking at a news conference after the EU leaders' summit in Brussels. 

The EU would be represented by Tusk and the European Commission president, Jean-Claude Juncker, The Associated Press reported. 

Tusk said the EU-Turkey dialogue should continue with meetings in various formats in hopes of addressing the outstanding issues. 

"We have to finalize some common initiatives with Turkey. Not only the visa liberalization, we need the fulfilment of our benchmarks," Tusk said, referring notably to an agreement that has helped curb flows of migrants into Europe and changes to the Turkey-EU customs union.

Turkey and the EU signed a refugee deal in March, which aimed to discourage irregular migration through the Aegean Sea by taking stricter measures against human traffickers and improving the conditions of nearly three million Syrian refugees in Turkey.        

The March 18 deal also allowed for the acceleration of Turkey's EU membership bid and visa-free travel for Turkish nationals within the Schengen area. 

In order for Turkish citizens to get visa-free travel inside the EU's Schengen Zone, Turkey needs to fulfil a total of 72 benchmarks, which also include a change in its anti-terror law. 

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