Turkish Press Review

ISTANBUL

Turkish dailies on Tuesday covered the EU-Turkey summit on the migration crisis and talked about International Women’s Day.

“Now the EU is thinking” was HABERTURK’s headline, reporting that Turkey presented proposals at Monday’s summit in Brussels.

“Turkey presented three main items. EU leaders said, ‘we agreed in principle and will work on these.’ The result is at March 17-18,” HABERTURK said.

“EU will work on Turkish plan for 10 days,” was HURRIYET’s headline.

HURRIYET listed Turkey’s proposals including request for visa-free travel for its citizens by the end of June, an additional 3 billion euros ($3.3 billion), the acceleration of talks regarding Turkey’s EU membership bid as well as an update of the Customs Union.

“Humane proposal ” ran YENI SAFAK on its front page. The paper also listed Ankara’s proposals to Brussels.

European leaders have been seeking ways to help stem refugee flow in the union.

The summit was organized to convince Turkey to prevent the influx of asylum-seekers into the 28-member-union.

“Visa-free EU in June,” was MILLIYET’s headline.

STAR reacted against the summit with the headline “Heartless summit”.

“Instead of seeking humane solutions to the refugee crisis, EU leaders gathered to convince Turkey. In the meantime, eleven children lost their lives in the Aegean Sea [while crossing into Greek islands],” STAR said.

The EU will work on Turkey’s proposals before the March 17-18 migration summit.

Turkish dailies also mentioned International Women’s Day.

“[Violence against women] is the biggest treason,” was VATAN’s headline, reporting that President Recep Tayyip Erdogan had reacted against violence targeting women.

“To be a woman is to have privileges in advance,” Erdogan said during a meeting for International Women’s Day.

“If there is no woman, there is no humanity,” was SABAH’s headline, covering Erdogan’s remarks on the eve of International Women’s Day.

“Turkey can develop its own model for women’s rights,” was HABETURK’s headline, quoting Erdogan.

In sport news, Turkish dailies covered Russian tennis player Maria Sharapova’s avowal of a failed drugs test at the Australian Open.

“Doping confession,” was HURRIYET’s headline.

Sharapova tested positive for meldonium - a substance prohibited by the World Anti-Doping Agency since Jan. 1, 2016.

Sharapova said that for the past 10 years, she had been given medicine called mildronate or meldonium by her doctor.

“Are you too Sharapova?” was HABETURK’s headline while MILLIYET said: “Sharapova tested positive for doping.”

Sharapova is ranked 7th by the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA).

In economic news, financial paper DUNYA claimed that the Turkish government would take steps to reform the real estate market, adding that these proposals would be ready in June.

One of the proposals is to partially lift tax exemptions if a person sells his/her house five years after buying it.