A dream Europe trip without a visa at the heart of Turkey's upcoming elections
Opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu promises to lift EU visa requirements for Turkish travelers within months if elected in May—but Europe insists compliance hinges on unresolved criteria from 2016.
It’s one of the main promises made by Turkish opposition leader Kemal Kiliçdaroğlu: allowing Turks to travel freely within the Schengen Zone without a visa. Currently, Turkish citizens must endure a long and cumbersome visa application process even for a single day in Europe.
We will come to power and win the presidency, and we will make this country a place where people can breathe freely within a year at the latest. In three months, every citizen will be able to go to Europe without a visa.
Kemal Kiliçdaroğlu
There’s just one catch—no one knows how the Republican People’s Party, which is locked in a tight race in the upcoming presidential election on May 14 against incumbent President Erdoğan, plans to deliver on this pledge or meet Europe’s requirements in such tight deadlines. While Kilicdaroglu has hinted at agreements with Germany—a key destination for Turkey’s diaspora—the German government quickly refuted those claims.
As part of the 2016 agreement under which the EU agreed to resume deportations of irregular migrants, Brussels demanded that Turkey meet 72 criteria across five categories—document security, migration management, public order and security, fundamental rights, and combatting irregular migration. Turkey has so far met 67 of these. But Germany has already ruled out the possibility of resolving the remaining five points "in three months." The two sides are now negotiating a separate data-sharing agreement on individuals convicted of serious crimes including terrorism, aside from visa discussions.
A specialist in regulatory monitoring and a content destination expert, she analyzes daily changes in entry formalities to turn complex administrative processes into practical guides. Her role blends ground-level expertise with technical precision to ensure the reliability of the information provided to travelers.
