Macron Accuses Turkey of Working with Isis Proxies
“The common enemy today is the terrorist groups. I’m sorry to say, we don’t have the same definition of terrorism around the table,” Macron remarked at a news conference alongside President Trump.
“When I look at Turkey, they are fighting against those who fought with us shoulder to shoulder against Isis and sometimes they work with Isis proxies,” Macron said.
The French president will meet Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan later in the day ahead of a Nato summit, also said he stood by comments he made last month alleging that Nato is strategically suffering from “brain death”.
Macron insisted there must be no “ambiguity” toward Isis, saying that Turkey’s actions against the Kurdish-led Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) that helped the allies fight the Isis group showed a need for better coordination.
In addition, he said the focus needed to be on tackling Isis, which had still not been defeated. “We have lost cooperation with Turkey, on security and trade and migration and European Union and France,” Macron said, adding that clarifications must be made at the summit.
“How is it possible to be a member of the alliance, to work with it, to be integrated and then buy things from Russia?” he asked, referring to Ankara’s purchase of Russia’s S-400 missile system.
