France condemns Turkey for ‘violating Berlin agreement on Libya’

French President Emmanuel Macron has lambasted his Turkish counterpart, Recep Tayyip Erdogan, for sending warships and “mercenaries” to crisis-hit Libya, stressing that Ankara is breaching an agreement reached at a summit in Berlin earlier this month to halt foreign interference in the North African country.

“These past few days we have seen Turkish warships accompanied by Syrian mercenaries arrive on Libyan soil. This is a serious and explicit infringement of what was agreed upon in Berlin,” the French president said on Wednesday, referring to a multinational summit held in the German capital earlier this month.

In his Wednesday remarks, Macron said the Turkish deployment of warships and militants to Libya was a “clear violation” of what Erdogan had promised at the Berlin summit. “It is a failure to keep his word,” Macron said.

The French president also dismissed a maritime deal reached by Ankara and the Libyan government last year that would allow Turkey and Libya to have access to an economic zone despite the objections of Greece, Egypt, and Cyprus, which are situated between the two geographically.

“France supports Greece and Cyprus with regards to the sovereignty in their maritime zones and, along with our European partners, condemns Turkey’s intrusions and provocations,” Macron said, adding, “I must reiterate that the prerequisite for any political solution in Libya is the cancellation of this document.”

In response to Macron’s comments, Turkish Foreign Ministry spokesman Hami Aksoy claimed in a statement later on Wednesday that France itself had been the main source of “problems” in Libya since 2011, when Paris played the leading role in a military campaign by NATO that ousted Libya’s former dictator Muammar Gaddafi and when chaos spread in the country.

The statement also accused the French government of giving “unconditional support” to Khalifa Haftar, accusing Paris of seeking to secure its say “on the natural resources in Libya” through that support.

For the past few weeks, Haftar has laid siege to the main oil fields in Libya, whose main income comes through exporting oil.

SS