Turkey accuses European Parliament of promoting terrorism

Turkey has accused the European Parliament of promoting terrorism by exhibiting photographs from Kurdish-controlled northern Syria.

The exhibition of 30 photos from northern Syria opened on July 12 by Josef Weidenholzer, an MP from the social democrat group of the European Parliament and includes photographs taken by Thomas Schmidinger.

“European Parliament has become an instrument for making propaganda of a terrorist organization and encouraging terrorism w/ the exhibition,” Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu said on Twitter.

Turkey has been enraged by the West's support for the Syrian Kurdish YPG militia in the battle against Daesh terrorists.

Ankara says the group is a terrorist organization with ties to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK) and fears the YPG will carve out an independent Kurdish state on its southern border.

Besides Ankara, the European Union and United States also consider the PKK as a terrorist organization. The PKK has been engaged in a three-decade fight for autonomy in Turkey’s Kurdish-dominated southeast.

On July 12, Turkish Foreign Ministry issued an statement in condemnation of the move by the European Parliament.

SS