Roundup: Turkey, Germany set up mechanism to boost economic ties

Turkey and Germany have agreed on setting up intergovernmental mechanism to boost ties in business and trade, while they remained at odds over Turkey's EU membership bid among other issues.

During the visit of Turkish Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu to Germany, both sides agreed to establish High Level Cooperation Council, an intergovernmental conference to deepen their cooperation in various fields, including business, investment and trade.

Davutoglu announced that the first meeting of the intergovernmental conference will be held in Turkey in either January or February of next year under the co-chairmanship of two prime ministers.

Germany is Turkey's largest trading partner with 38 billion U.S. dollars in annual trade volume in 2013. The volume was recorded as 34 billion U.S. dollars in the first eleven months of 2014, almost the same to 2013 in the same period, according to the latest data from the statistics agency of Turkish government.

Many Turkish and German companies are active investors in their respective markets.

The High Level Cooperation Council is expected to boost that cooperation further because it cuts the red tape in bureaucracy with the engagement of sensor government officials.

GERMANY OPPOSES TURKEY'S EU BID

However, both countries continue to have different opinions over Ankara's bid for full EU membership.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel has remained firm in her opposition to Turkey's accession to the EU.

Speaking at a joint press conference with her Turkish counterpart on Monday, the German prime minister said her views had not changed.

Asked to comment on the remark by Turkish Prime Minister in which he claimed that cultural tensions in Europe such as last week's Paris attacks would not be as high if Turkey became a EU member, Merkel simply brushed off the remark as "speculative."

She suggested that the main problem stalling accession talks is the status of the divided island of Cyprus.

She told journalists that she has discussed with Ahmet Davutoglu about freedom of expression, press freedom, counter-terrorism issues and developments in Syria and Iraq.

Mehmet Seyfettin Erol, the head of Ankara's International Strategic and Security Research Center (USGAM), told Xinhua that Turkey must find a way to work with Germany, the main economic engine in the EU, for its interests.

FOREIGN FIGHTERS MAJOR CONCERN

The prevention of foreign fighters from transiting to Syria via Turkey was also among topics of discussion during the Turkish prime minister's visit.

Just on the day Davutoglu arrived in Germany, the head of Germany's domestic intelligence agency Hans-Georg Maassen urged Turkey to do more to prevent foreign fighters from crossing into Syria to join the Islamic State (IS) group.

Speaking on a German TV on Monday, Hans-Georg Maassen said Turkey is a key country to prevent foreign fighters from traveling back and forth between Syria and Europe, since about 90 percent of the extremists traveled to the region via Turkey.

In a press briefing with Merkel, Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said it is not fair to accuse Turkey of not doing much to seal the border, since Turkey has suffered more than others.

Ahmet Davutoglu said the border is 910 kilometers long and is difficult to protect, but Turkey is doing its best to prevent terrorist crossing while maintaining an open-door policy with refugees fleeing the conflict in Syria. Turkey is home to about 2 million Syrian and Iraqi refugees.

He also called European countries to do more in sharing the intelligence on militants, saying that Turkey has so far prevented about 7,000 people from entering Turkey to join radical groups.

Ankara came under criticism in the wake of Paris killings for not doing enough when law enforcement agencies determined that a suspected militant woman, the partner of a man who killed a five people in a grocery store last week in Paris, actually travelled to Turkey.

RACIST ATTACKS ON RISE IN EUROPE

For his part, the Turkish prime minister warned against xenophobic and racist attacks in Europe, saying that he is against associating any religion or ethnicity with terrorism.

Neo-Nazi groups in Germany attacked a mosque in Dormagen in the state of Northern Rhine-Westphalia on Monday, a second attack targeting a Turkish mosque in three weeks.

Germany is home to some 3 million Turks, one third of them are German citizens, taking 75 percent of the German Muslim population.

Davutoglu's visit came amid ongoing rallies of Patriotic Europeans against the Islamization of the West, which have bought 25,000 people together in Dresden on Monday.

Integration of Turks into German society is another issue that creates a rift between Turkey and Germany. Meeting with Turkish community members, the Turkish Prime Minister said "sacrificing identity, language or tradition in any way is not and will not be a way of integration at all." Endit