France's Macron urges respect of rule of law in talks with Erdogan

PARIS – French President Emmanuel Macron told his Turkish counterpart on Friday that democratic countries had to respect the rule of law in their fight against terrorism as he voiced concerns about the fate of students, teachers and journalists in Turkey.

Macron said after talks with Tayyip Erdogan at the Elysee presidential palace that they had disagreements about how they saw human rights.

"Our democracies must be strong standing up to terrorism... But at the same time our democracies must completely protect the rule of law," Macron said in a joint news conference.

Macron also said that recent developments in Turkey did not allow for any progress in Ankara's EU accession process. It would be hypocritical to pretend new chapters in the accession talks could be opened, he said.