The flare-up of tension between Turkey and the Netherlands has led to some "historically unprecedented practices," Greek MEP for SYRIZA Stelios Kouloglou commented in an interview with the Athens-Macedonian News Agency (ANA) on Sunday. These included the decision by Dutch authorities to forbid Turkish ministers from visiting the country but also Ankara's response, which described German Chancellor Angela Merkel and Dutch politicians as "Nazis," Kouloglou said.

According to the MEP, the tension between the two sides has an "expiration date," which in the case of the Netherlands is the March 15 general election in the country and for Turkey the April 16 referendum. Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was "in a very difficult position" and might even trigger a new crisis or postpone or even cancel the referendum if he was uncertain about winning, Kouloglou added.

Among others, and prompted by an event on the issue organised in Brussels, Kouloglou commented on the phenomenon of 'fake news'. He noted that fake news had been circulated by the U.S. President Donald Trump via Twitter during the pre-election campaign in the United States, and was now also seen in the campaign run by the Dutch far-right candidate Geert Wilders. The way to protect against it was to get information from multiple sources and not from 'friends' in social media platforms like Facebook, whose main purpose was not to supply news, Kouloglou said.

13.3.2017