Turkey minister calls EU envoys meeting after arrests criticism

Turkey’s EU Affairs Minister Omer Celik on Sunday called all the bloc’s envoys in Ankara for an unusual meeting, the ministry said, following searing European criticism of the arrest of pro-Kurdish MPs.
Celik has invited the EU envoys to the meeting on Monday where he will give an address “on the latest developments in our country”, the ministry said in a statement.
The EU Commission and member states have reacted angrily to the jailing on Friday of nine MPs from the pro-Kurdish Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP), including its co-leaders Selahattin Demirtas and Figen Yuksekdag.
EU foreign affairs head Federica Mogherini and EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn said in a joint statement the EU was “gravely concerned”, adding Yuksekdag and Demirtas were “our trusted and valued interlocutors.”
“These developments… compromise parliamentary democracy in Turkey,” they said.
Compounding the tensions, an Istanbul court on Saturday ordered the jailing pending trial of nine executives and editorial staff from the opposition Cumhuriyet newspaper.
Turkey’s bid to join the EU dates back to the 1960s with formal talks starting in 2005. But the process has been mired in problems which the current tensions will do nothing to help.
So far, only 16 chapters of the 35 chapter accession process have been opened for Turkey.