Announcement

Collapse
No announcement yet.

BEIRUT: Gloomy and frustrated, Turkey gears up for EU showdown

Collapse
X
 
  • Filter
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts

  • BEIRUT: Gloomy and frustrated, Turkey gears up for EU showdown

    The Daily Star, Lebanon
    Oct 1 2005

    Gloomy and frustrated, Turkey gears up for EU showdown


    Compiled by Daily Star staff
    Saturday, October 01, 2005


    ANKARA: Turkey urged the European Union to show "honesty" on its
    troubled membership bid, as anger and frustration simmered over what
    Turks see as European backpedaling on pledges to admit the country
    into the bloc. Britain meanwhile stressed the "enormous strategic"
    stakes of admitting Turkey to the European Union.

    With just three days left before the start of membership talks, EU
    countries are still wrangling over accession terms for Turkey,
    leaving Ankara on the edge and its decades-old dream of integrating
    Europe shrouded in uncertainty.

    "If we fail to see the honesty we expect, Turkey's response will
    undoubtedly be very different from what has been said so far," Prime
    Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan said in the northern city of Corum, the
    Anatolia news agency reported.

    The EU will hold an emergency meeting of foreign ministers tomorrow
    to seek a compromise on a negotiating.

    The deadlock is blamed on Austria's insistence to offer Turkey
    "privileged partnership" as an alternative to full membership, an
    option Ankara flatly rejects.

    "Some people in the EU have fallen prey to fanaticism, unable to free
    themselves from prejudice," Erdogan said.

    Britain warned that the stakes are high if Turkey is left out in the
    cold, because it could serve as a democratic "beacon" for the
    troubled Middle East across its borders.

    "Turkey is of enormous strategic importance to the EU," Britain's
    Europe Minister Douglas Alexander told BBC radio.

    "Successfully integrating Turkey in the EU we believe would help us
    tackle most of the many difficult problems that we face in the modern
    world," he added.

    Sweden, Denmark and Finland joined Britain in rejecting a delay in
    entry talks.

    Danish Foreign Minister Per Stig Moeller said the European Commission
    had clearly stated that "we are launching these negotiations with the
    aim of including (Turkey)."


    "If this is not possible (by the end of the process), then we should
    try to find a different solution (but) it is too early now to
    determine what this other solutions should be," he said.

    For her part, Austria's Foreign Minister Ursula Plassnik argued that
    Vienna's concerns are shared "all over Europe."

    Many Europeans are concerned about the EU's ability to absorb Turkey.

    "What we propose is an option in case membership does not work out,"
    Plassnik told the Associated Press.

    Full membership for Turkey is possible "one day - if Turkey fulfills
    the requirements and if the European Union is also in a position to
    absorb Turkey," she said. "However, we should now listen to the
    concerns voiced by so many people across Europe."

    Meanwhile, the head of the Armenian Church in Turkey sent a letter to
    EU foreign ministers warning that a delay in entry talks could
    undermine efforts to bring together the Muslim East and the Christian
    West.

    Minorities in Turkey have strongly supported the country's EU bid in
    the hopes of greater democratic reforms and freedoms.

    The leader of the largest non-Muslim group in Turkey, Patriarch
    Mesrob, wrote: "Turkey has expended great efforts to implement the
    union criteria and has in a positive sense been steered toward real
    change on the democratic road.

    "Pressures in recent days from various circles to postpone Turkey's
    membership process cause us concern," he added.

    "Such undesired developments will be a blow not only to Turkey and
    Europe but to reconciliation between East and West," he wrote. -
    Agencies

    From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
Working...
X