Turkey said Monday it would allow Germany’s defence minister to visit an air base in the south of the country after sparking a row by barring a German delegation from making the trip.
Ursula von der Leyen had said Sunday she would personally visit the Incirlik base, used to launch coalition raids against Islamic State (ISIS) jihadists in Syria, after Turkey blocked other German politicians from going there.
Ankara had said the scheduled July visit by Germany’s state secretary for defence Ralf Brauksiepe and other lawmakers would have been “inappropriate”, sparking anger from von der Leyen.
German media reported the ban was in retaliation for the German parliament’s recognition of the Ottoman forces’ killing of Armenians during World War II as a genocide, but Turkish officials did not confirm this publicly.
“I have never experienced anything like this. It goes without saying that the leadership of the defence ministry should be able to visit German soldiers in the field,” von der Leyen told the Bild am Sonntag newspaper.
Turkish Prime Minister Binali Yildirim said at a news conference in Ankara on Monday that her own visit could go ahead.
“Turkey will grant permission,” he said.
“The German defence minister can visit Incirlik with ease. There is no problem.”
Germany in December agreed to send Tornado surveillance jets and tanker aircraft to Incirlik to aid the multinational coalition fighting ISIS in Syria.
But Berlin angered NATO ally Turkey when its parliament passed a resolution this month calling the Armenian killings a “genocide”.
