The refugee impasse

While the number of people forcibly displaced due to conflict, violence, and persecution has reached record levels globally, Turkey continues to be the country hosting the highest number of refugees in the world.

While official data suggests there are approximately 4 million refugees in Turkey, unofficial data indicates that the number of refugees and illegal migrants in Turkey exceeds 13 million.

Large-scale human movements have long been discouraged at both national and international levels on the grounds that they create instability in host countries.

In the recent past, Jews seeking to escape the violence, persecution, and death threats of the Nazis were not accepted by many countries, most notably the United States, the United Kingdom, and France.

For example, the extraordinary efforts made by Otto Frank, the father of Anne Frank—whose diary is read worldwide—to travel from Nazi-occupied Netherlands to the U.S. ended in failure, and as a result, he lost his wife and two children in concentration camps.

It is a known fact that even today, Western countries in particular persistently avoid accepting refugees.

Readmission agreements made with the European Union have, unfortunately, turned our country into a buffer zone.

Large-scale and sudden migrations create problems for the host country in many areas, including political, cultural, economic, and sociological spheres.

Indeed, during the population exchange in the early years of the Republic, Turkey felt the need to take precautions, and the Settlement Law No. 2510, published in the Official Gazette dated June 21, 1934, established the rule that "those of non-Turkish descent cannot settle wherever they wish, those whose mother tongue is not Turkish cannot establish independent neighborhoods, cannot form groups of workers or artists, and the population of foreigners in a municipality cannot exceed 10%."

The Syrian civil war that began in 2011 caused an intense influx of refugees into neighboring countries, especially Turkey.

This was followed by a wave of refugees from Afghanistan after it came under Taliban rule.

Today, Syrians, the largest migrant group, have transitioned from being neighbors across the border to being hosted within the country.

While the majority of Syrian refugees initially stayed in refugee camps, they subsequently migrated to various provinces and began living in areas where Turkish citizens of lower social and economic status reside.

This situation has increased encounters in places like public transport, parks, and hospitals, while also increasing competition with the local population in job sectors, suppressing wages, causing house rents to rise, and consequently fueling conflicts with the local population.

Refugees have spatially changed and transformed the regions where they live and settle in high concentrations.

I had the opportunity to observe this situation in Şanlıurfa, where I went for the holiday break.

I saw that the Syrians living in this city have formed independent neighborhoods, opened their own businesses and entertainment venues, and are living as a society detached from the local population.

I heard that a local citizen from Urfa who wanted to work in a business opened by Syrians was told, "We do not employ foreign workers," a topic that is being discussed with astonishment throughout all of Şanlıurfa.

For the migrants themselves, the problem of meeting basic needs such as education, housing/nutrition, and security also stands before Turkey.

Tension is rising between refugees and the segments of the population that enter into job and wage competition with them, and dangerous clashes that are occasionally reflected in the public eye occur.

For this reason, anti-refugee sentiment is finding an increasing number of supporters in society.

Today, issues related to refugees have become one of the main items on Turkey's political agenda. It is not possible for refugees to integrate in terms of both language and culture in the places where they have settled.

On the other hand, it is becoming increasingly difficult to send back the refugees who have become established, and rhetoric in this direction does not go beyond mere wishes. It is a necessity to prevent irregular migration towards Turkey, to register irregular migrants who have entered our country through illegal means, and to research the necessary remedies for their return.

Return depends on the elimination of the phenomena that cause migration and the preparation of a safe environment for return.

Therefore, Turkey must exert intense effort to create a safe zone for this purpose.

The "refugee problem" in Turkey should be handled as a supra-political issue, and every segment of society must produce solutions to get rid of this situation that darkens our country's future.

Furthermore, the state should protect Turkey's borders against refugees, taking the defense of Taksim on May 1st as an example.