Migration Agreement: The EU cannot find out how the refugee fund it gave to Turkey was spent

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European Union auditors said they could not determine whether some of the billions of euros the bloc gave Turkey to help Syrian refugees actually had an impact.

The money from the migration deal signed between the EU and Turkey in 2016 has been used to provide cash payment cards for expenses to some of Turkey’s more than 4 million registered refugees, to improve education and health, to help people better integrate into society, and to help people fleeing war in Syria meet their needs. It is used to build facilities that can be heard.

However, in its follow-up on whether the money was used effectively last year, the European Court of Auditors (ECA) reported that Turkey’s Ministry of National Education had refused to provide information that would allow them to evaluate what impact EU projects had.

“I’m quite sure that European citizens want to see some results coming from the various development and humanitarian aid projects financed by the EU,” EU Court of Auditors Bettina Jakobsen told reporters. said.

Jakobsen added that without data it is not possible to reach a conclusion about measuring the impact or sustainability of education projects signed by the EU.

“They said, ‘We don’t have the data.'”

At least 530 million euros have been earmarked to “support quality inclusive education of refugees in Turkey,” according to the European Commission, the bloc’s executive body. This money was intended to pay teachers’ salaries and cover educational equipment, Turkish language and teacher training, counseling and other guidance services.

Auditors are seeking a list of schools receiving EU support and information on the number of refugee students attending, as well as whether children who are not receiving education are being reintegrated into the school system and exam pass rates.

When asked by the Associated Press (AP) what prevented auditors from getting information from the education ministry, an EU auditor involved in the process said: “They just claimed they didn’t have the data.” he replied.

“We know that the data should normally exist,” said the auditor, who was not named in accordance with the regulations of the EU Court of Auditors, but noted that it was not up to them to guess why they did not want to provide the data.

A Court of Accounts official also told the AP that it is relatively rare for Turkish officials to fail to cooperate with auditors.

The commission was unsuccessful in its requests for information

Overall, given the challenges of the coronavirus pandemic, major earthquakes that hit Turkey and Syria in February 2023, and Turkey’s rampant inflation, the auditors found that the EU funding package “provided relevant support to refugees and host communities” in Turkey.

But Jakobsen said auditors “found weaknesses in the commission’s assessment of project budgets” and noted that the EU’s executive body “did not systematically assess whether project costs were reasonable or compare similar costs between different projects.”

Auditors and officials of the commission responsible for ensuring the bloc’s money is spent properly have made joint and individual requests for information, but without success.

Inspectors were able to visit some schools and hospitals benefiting from EU funds and found that the facilities were used by refugees and Turkish students and that teachers worked there.

It set an example for the Egypt and Tunisia agreements

Under a migration deal signed between EU leaders and Turkey in 2016, the bloc pledged to provide Turkey with at least 6 billion euros to help it deal with migrants from Syria. In return, Türkiye promised Europe to stop migrants from leaving its territory.

In March 2016, a month after the agreement came into force, the Turkish government reported that the number of immigrants crossing illegally into Greece had fallen from around 6,000 per day to 130 in November 2015.

Leaders announced that they plan to send another 3 billion euros to refugees in Turkey in 2021. The agreement, seen as a great success in Europe, Tunisia And Sweetcorn It served as a template for newer and more detailed agreements with.