The Humanitarian dimension of the Refugee Crisis in Turkey: Challenges and Prospects

The protracted armed conflict in Syria has created 4.3 million registered refugees outside Syria. More than 2.3 million of them are hosted in Turkey. The massive influx of refugees and irregular migration has become a common challenge requiring cooperation between the EU and Turkey. March, 18 EU-Turkey Agreement introduced a series of ‘action points’. The deal has immediately sparked heated discussions concerning its implications forthe humanitarian dimension of the refugee crisis.

The first of a series of workshops on the refugee crisis under the Global Turkey in Europe Programme will take place in Istanbul to discuss the humanitarian dimension of the refugee crisis in Turkey, including the issue of whether Turkey qualifies as a safe third country, one of the key implicit assumptions of the EU-Turkey deal.