Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan on Friday told Germany it cannot scare Ankara with threats, in an escalating row over a wave of arrests that prompted Berlin to step up warnings to German tourists and investors.
“They (Germany) cannot scare us with these threats, they should know this,” Erdogan said in a speech in Istanbul. “You (Germany) do not have the power to smear Turkey... Or the power to scare us,” he added.
Relations between key NATO partners Turkey and Germany — already brittle in recent years — have been further eroded in recent days by an intensifying row over the Turkish authorities’ recent wave of arrests.