German Chancellor Angela Merkel | John MacDougall/AFP via Getty Images | John MacDougall/AFP via Getty Images Germany to push for tough line on Turkey with EU leaders Chancellor Angela Merkel wants ‘determined course of action’ on whether to end or suspend membership talks.

BERLIN — Germany will push the European Union to reconsider its relationship with Turkey — including whether to suspend or terminate accession talks — at the next meeting of EU leaders in October, Chancellor Angela Merkel said Tuesday.

"I will advocate for a determined course of action on the question," Merkel told the German parliament, looking ahead to the next meeting of the European Council on October 19-20.

Addressing the last plenary session of parliament before Germany's September 24 general election, Merkel said it was important for the EU to face Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan en bloc and not to "fight over the question of our future dealing with Turkey in front of Erdoğan's eyes."

She warned that anything but a united stance "would weaken Europe's position dramatically," while also cautioning that relations with Turkey were “of a strategic nature” and any measures taken by the EU should be “determined but also carefully considered."

Relations between Berlin and Ankara have deteriorated dramatically over the last two years, fueled most recently by the arrests of German citizens in Turkey. At least 12 Germans are currently being held as political prisoners, according to the German government.

Addressing a full Bundestag on Tuesday morning, Merkel called political developments in Turkey "more than alarming," and warned that the country was "increasingly leaving the path of the rule of law."

Talks on Turkish membership of the EU have all but ground to a halt due to Erdoğan's increasingly authoritarian rule after last year's coup attempt. But EU officials have previously argued it is better to maintain dialogue with Turkey, particularly as the EU relies on Ankara to keep implementing a deal that dramatically reduced the flow of migrants into Europe.

Merkel said her government has also asked Estonia, which currently holds the presidency of the Council of the European Union, not to put any negotiations over an enhanced customs union between the EU and Turkey on the agenda anytime soon.

Ahead of the German election, Merkel's conservative bloc holds a big lead of around 15 percentage points over the center-left Social Democrats, led by former European Parliament President Martin Schulz.

In the sole TV debate between the two lead candidates ahead of the vote, Schulz took direct aim at Merkel’s Turkey policy on Sunday night, telling her that “the only language understood by the government in Ankara is ‘That’s enough!'” He said that if he was elected chancellor, he would push for breaking off accession talks immediately.

In Tuesday's parliamentary session, Merkel sought to shift some of the responsibility for the tension over the accession talks to Schulz's party.

"We conservatives have always been skeptical of, or against, taking up these membership negotiations," Merkel said, adding that her predecessor as chancellor, Social Democrat Gerhard Schröder, had pushed the EU to begin the talks with Ankara in the early 2000s.