Syrians in Turkey are being treated badly – but so are the Turkish people

A flood of stories are emerging about Turkey’s alleged mistreat of the perhaps 4 million Syrian refugees in their midst. Syrians in Istanbul and other cities say they’re feeling the heat as a rough economy frustrates Turks who fear refugees are taking jobs and driving down wages while changing the character of their neighbourhoods.

Turkish officials have vowed to crack down on Syrian and other refugees who don’t have their papers in order – especially those registered to live in smaller towns but who have gravitated to the bigger cities. Turkish officials, including the interior minister Suleyman Soylu, who invited international journalists to a lengthy briefing last week, insisted Syria is following international standards and law. The Turks also claim that no one is being deported back to Syria against their will, which is likely untrue.

But it’s worth putting the Syrian refugee crisis into a broader context. Turkey is suffering disproportionately as a result of the Syrian war, taking in millions of refugees as a result of a policy and security debacle that is a global responsibility. Neither Turkey nor Syria’s neighbours Lebanon and Jordan have the capacity to take in so many people, and they are bursting at the seams. The European Union agreed to cough up €6bn (£5.4bn) to help Turkey manage the refugee crisis, but that’s only a fraction of the $40bn (£32.6bn) Ankara says it has spent since 2011.

Meanwhile Russian-backed offensives in Syria’s northern regions are expected to displace hundreds of thousands more. Turkish officials are clearly rattled.

“We are living in a world in which the borders between countries are overrun,” Soylu told the journalists, complaining of illegal migrants, drug traffickers and extremist militant groups utilising the same networks to transgress Turkey’s international frontiers. It’s also worth remembering that Turkey and the countries surrounding Syria are not exactly known for their systematic adherence to human rights and the rule of law.

Journalists, policymakers and readers might consider whether the proportion of Syrian refugees abused by the Turkish system is any higher than the proportion of ordinary Turkish people that are also failed spectacularly by their own government.

Yours,

Borzou Daragahi

International correspondent