Presidency’s Director of Communications Fahrettin Altun commented on the news reports in the British press about the establishment of refugee hubs in Türkiye for Afghan refugees, saying, “Our Ministry of Affairs has immediately issued a statement, revealing that such reports do not reflect the reality. Unfortunately, the opposition persisted in their lies and slanders. Let us reiterate: there is no such request, and even if there is, we will never accept it.”
Director of Communications Altun shared a post on his social media account, indicating that such claims came as a surprise for everyone.
Stating that they witnessed once again how devastating and misleading disinformation, which President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan refers to as “terror of lies”, can be, Altun noted:
"Let's take a look at what happened all together: UK Secretary of State for Defence penned an article on Afghanistan for Mail On Sunday. The article said, “'We will establish a series of processing hubs across the region outside Afghanistan for those Afghans we have an obligation to bring to this country.”
In other words, Wallace said that they would establish a series of processing hubs across the region outside Afghanistan for those Afghans they had an obligation to bring to the UK. Nowhere in the article did it say or even imply “Türkiye”.
Altun stated that the article penned by the UK Secretary of State for Defence was distorted by certain foreign media outlets well-known for their anti-Türkiye sentiment, and emphasized that the article was served as if it said “the UK will establish refugee hubs in Pakistan and Türkiye”, although the UK Secretary of State for Defence never mentioned “Türkiye”.