Prague, March 15 (CTK) – The Czech Pirates demand that the EU insist on the observance of democratic values in Turkey and push for an end to the fighting in Syria, they said on Thursday, adding that they will submit an appeal in this respect to PM Andrej Babis (ANO) at parties’ talks on foreign policy on Thursday.
“A few years ago, Turkey significantly diverted from the path that is compatible with the EU’s values. The Pirates would not turn a blind eye to censorship, the suppression of the opposition and the aggressive anti-Kurdish policy at home and abroad,” the Pirates wrote in a press release.
Pirate chairman Ivan Bartos said Europe and Turkey need each other, but he rejected cooperation with an undemocratic regime.
“We must not become a silent and passive ally of an unreliable, aggressive and authoritarian state that acts actively against our interests,” Bartos said.
At the meeting on Thursday, which Babis convoked at the initiative of Civic Democrat (ODS) chairman Petr Fiala, the heads of the parties in parliament are to seek a joint position on foreign and EU policies with the aim to secure their united stands on the international scene including Brussels.
On Wednesday, the Pirates called on the Czech Foreign Ministry and the EU diplomacy to do their utmost to stop the shooting in Syria, where the war has lasted seven years now and the fights continue in spite all diplomatic efforts to have them stopped.
“The seven-year Syrian conflict does not have a military solution but only a political one. It is a sad circumstance of the horrors of the seven-year Syrian war that no special attention is being paid to such atrocities any more as they have repeated with an appalling regularity,” Jan Lipavsky (Pirates), who is a deputy chairman of the Czech lower house’s defence committee, said.
