“As a result of a gradual Islamisation domestic and foreign policy of Ankara since 2011, Turkey has developed into a central action platform for Islamist groups of the Near and Mid-East regions”, it quoted the document as saying.
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ARD public television reported Tuesday the statement was contained in a classified section of a reply to an opposition party.
Hitting back at the report, Turkey’s Foreign Ministry on Wednesday said the allegations reflected a “twisted mentality” and an attempt to “wear down our country”.
Hamas is listed as terrorist organization both in the European Union and the U.S., and the German Interior Ministry believes that Turkey supported its militant actions against Israel over the blockade of the Gaza Strip.
It alleges that the government of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan supports Palestinian militant group Hamas, Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood and “groups in the armed Islamist opposition in Syria”, all of which follow Sunni Islam, the same strand as the majority of Muslim Turks. Following the initial success of the Arab Spring, Egypt’s first ever democratically elected head of state in 2012, Islamist president Mohammed Morsi, was eventually overthrown by the military in 2013, while the Egyptian court banned the Brotherhood and ordered its assets to be seized.
“We are deeply convinced that Turkey is the most important partner with regards to the fight against the so-called Islamic State group”, he said.
The document belonged to the German government and it represented a response to an official question from the political group of Die Linke.
The claims in question are “a new indication of the distorted mindset which has been attempting to weaken our country by means of [attacking] our president and our government”, said the Turkish Foreign Ministry in a written statement released on August 17.
Germany and Turkey have strong historic links, with the largest Turkish diaspora in the world following decades of “guest worker” schemes aimed at reviving the German economy following the end of the Second World War.
However, relations between the two soured in June after Germany’s parliament approved a resolution to classify the 1915 massacres of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire a “genocide”.
Ankara has also accused Europe of not doing enough to tackle militant groups at home.
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Germany’s European affairs minister Michael Roth, a Social Democrat, said on Tuesday that it would be hard to fulfil the five remaining criteria that would grant Turkish citizens visa-free travel to the EU in October, as planned.
