On 7 March 2016, the EU Heads of State or Government held a summit with Turkey to strengthen their cooperation on the migration and refugee crisis. European Council President Donald Tusk chaired the meeting and Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoğlu represented Turkey. The meeting was followed by an informal meeting of the members of the European Council.

Turkey introduced new demands, as follows:

• Additional funding for the Refugee Facility for Syrians
• Visa-liberalization for Turkish citizens by 1 June 2016
• Accelerating Turkey’s long-stalled EU accession talks
• Commitment to resettle refugees, in line with so-called "one for one" basis where one Syrian returned to Turkey from Greece would equal one Syrian resettled from Turkey to the EU.

At the end of the summit the EU Heads of State or Government issued a Statement agreeing on the principles of a possible agreement with Turkey, on further support to Greece and on the need to re-establish the normal functioning of Schengen. President Tusk was assigned with the task to work out the details of the new agreement with Turkey before the next European Council on 17-18 March.