BERLIN: Chancellor Olaf Scholz will meet Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan next week, a German official said on Friday, at a time of renewed tensions between the countries due to the Israel-Hamas war.
The leaders’ talks in the German capital on Friday evening, will “strongly focus on developments in the Middle East”, a government spokeswoman told a regular press briefing in Berlin.
Turkiye’s relations with the European Union, long troubled by criticism of Ankara’s democratic standards, are under renewed strain over Erdogan’s stance on the conflict between Israel and Hamas.
The Turkish leader has portrayed Hamas as “liberators” or “mujahideen” fighting for their land.
He has accused Israel of committing war crimes in Gaza and recalled Turkiye’s ambassador to Tel Aviv.
Vowing to destroy Hamas, Israel has relentlessly bombarded the Gaza Strip, and sent in ground troops. More than 10,800 people in Gaza, many of them children, have been killed, according to the Palestinian territory’s health ministry.
Turkiye is technically a candidate for eventual EU membership and, even if this seems a distant prospect, Erdogan’s position – which differs sharply from the bloc’s – has caused unease.
It also stands in stark contrast to the position taken by Berlin, the EU’s most populous member.
Scholz has vowed to stand by Israel’s side and was the first head of government to visit the country to show solidarity following the October 7 attacks.
Last week, Berlin banned Hamas activities and organisations linked to the group, with Germany’s interior minister calling it a “terrorist organisation that aims to destroy the state of Israel”.
At Friday’s briefing, spokeswoman Christiane Hoffmann acknowledged the German government “has a very different stance and classification regarding Hamas than the Turkish president” and there were likely to be discussions on the topic.
Germany is home to the world’s biggest Turkish community overseas, and Erdogan received strong backing from Turkish voters in the country when he won re-election in May.
Some pro-Palestinian demonstrations in Germany have descended into violence, and Hoffmann was asked whether Scholz would press Erdogan to use his influence to encourage communities in Germany to behave moderately.
She declined to be drawn on the topic.
Other topics on the agenda will be military alliance NATO – of which Turkiye and Germany are both members – and migration.
European countries are facing a fresh influx of migrants.
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