Turkish opposition leader seeks meeting with Assad in Damascus

The chairman of Turkey’s main opposition party plans to travel to Syria this month to meet with Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad to “resolve the Syrian refugee crisis” between Turkey and Syria.

Speaking to a Turkish television channel on Thursday, Republican People’s Party (CHP) Chairman Özgür Özel said he would lead a party delegation on a trip to Damascus via Lebanon later this month, although he did not specify a date.

“I will make an incredible effort for Turkey to resolve this issue with Assad and find European funds. We will conduct our biggest campaign. We only want everyone to show the will to rid Turkey of the refugee problem,” Özel said.

The CHP leader’s remarks follow days of unrest across Turkey that began Sunday night in the central province of Kayseri, with attacks on Syrian-owned homes, shops and vehicles following allegations that a Syrian man sexually abused his relative’s 5-year-old daughter.

Social media platform X has been flooded with extremist users calling for the deportation of Syrian refugees to Turkey, a sentiment fueled by opposition politicians since last year.

The violence spread in the following days to the provinces of Hatay, Gaziantep, Konya, Bursa and a district of Istanbul, according to Turkey’s National Intelligence Agency (MIT). Social media reported some injuries among Syrians.

Subsequently, hundreds of angry Syrians took to the streets in several cities in northwestern Syria, an opposition-held area where Turkey maintains thousands of troops supporting opposition forces and fighting the PKK/YPG terrorist group.

“We cannot accept a repeat of the Kayseri incident,” Özel said.

He said the CHP delegation would go to Syria as a “party of Turkey.”

“I spoke to President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan about it and he welcomed it,” Özel said.

But Özel’s secular CHP party was among other opposition parties, such as the nationalist Good Party (IP) and the far-right, ultra-nationalist Victory Party (ZP), which led a broad campaign to send Syrians home ahead of national elections last year, blaming Syrians for the economic crisis, housing and rent problems.

Turkey is home to at least 3.6 million Syrian refugees who fled the civil war in 2012, most of whom have temporary protected status.

Erdoğan advocates a political solution to the Syrian crisis and a dignified and voluntary return of Syrians.

Earlier this year, Özel had said he would visit Palestine to deliver “an important message” to the world and Turkey amid Israeli attacks on the Gaza Strip, but the trip never took place.