The EU pays 6 billion euros to Turkey between 2017 and 2020

Following Turkey's illegal moves in Cypriot territorial waters to explore new gas wells, pre-EU aid to Ankara was reduced by 146 million euros, but total aid worth several billion was retained.

Turkey receives these funds as an official candidate for EU membership and aims to help it establish the principles of the rule of law.

The French media have been discreet about the amount of such aid since the mid-2000s so that its announcement will not support sovereign voices.

Nicolas Sarkozy, during his presidency of the Union for a Popular Movement (2004-2007) and then France, confirmed that he did not agree with Turkey's accession to the European Union, but announced that he does not oppose opening the door to negotiations.

Françoise Grosset, a member of the European Parliament for the Union for a Popular Movement (UMP), instructed to vote on pre-accession funds allocated to Turkey during a parliamentary session in July 2006. The appropriations amounted to € 2.26 billion for the period 2007-2009, and then increased aid to € 3,937 billion for the period 2010-2012.

Recently, France has allocated 865.7 million euros for rural development in Turkey according to the Ministry of Finance, while small French farmers suffer, France contributes 16.4% to the EU budget, and the total value of France paid to help Turkey is 787 million euros in the period 2007-2013, of which 142 million euros in agriculture.

The second phase of pre-accession assistance entered into force in 2014 and ends in 2020, after which, there will be a third phase from 2021 to 2027.

The European Commission announced this at a press conference on March 19, 2019, that the EU will continue to provide funds to help partners prepare for their future membership in the EU, namely Albania, Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro and Turkey.

Pre-EU aid should not be confused with the aid negotiated by Brussels, urging Turkey to include the three billion euros of immigrants.

On March 27, there was a sharp debate in the European Parliament over aid allocated to Turkey, and MP Arnaud Danyan proposed that this aid be renamed and clearly separated from the issue of EU enlargement, which means keeping it (under another name).

Some politicians expressed dissatisfaction with this situation, and so, in 2016, the German Bundestag's vice president, Johannes Singhammer, said that this aid was only a big joke, and it should be canceled, but nothing happened.

The European Court of Auditors said it was impossible to assess the impact of the aid, but the European Commission said: "We will reassess the situation in Turkey permanently and reallocate these funds if necessary and when necessary" and that the European taxpayer continues to pay the money without knowing.

But how big is this money? One politician, Francois Asselino, stated in April 2017 that 6 billion euros had been granted to Turkey, the authors of the radio program Le Vrai-faux de l'info wanted to verify this figure, and in an episode on 20 April 2017, journalist Geraldine Wisner stated that the figure The real is slightly larger, and that seven billion euros have already been transferred to Turkey, and another six billion will be paid from 2017 to 2020, of which three billion are for refugee management, the other three are pre-accession assistance, and the European Commission itself has provided these figures. To the journalist, for France, it has paid almost a billion euros.

All this is taking place as President Erdogan continues to imprison 100 journalists, shut down opposition media, destroy libraries, support fighting in Syria, and occupy Cyprus, since Europe is diplomatically weak. Why does the Turkish president stop his rush to Islamism?