BBC News
Oct 6 2004
Analysis: EU’s Turkish challenge
By Paul Reynolds
BBC News Online world affairs correspondent
Turkey’s accession to the European Union would not only bring a huge
Muslim population into the EU, but would extend its boundaries deep
into the Caucasus mountains and down towards the plains of ancient
Mesopotamia.
Turkey – a bridge between East and West?
The EU would have borders with Syria, Iraq, Iran, Georgia and
Armenia.
For some this would be a good thing. Turkey was once the “sick man of
Europe” as its empire began to decay and other powers circled around,
fighting each other, as in Crimea.
Turkey as a bridge
Now it would be a link between East and West, between a continent
with a Christian history and a land of Muslim faith in which both
would respect religion, but not rely on religion to determine the
course of government.
It would extend the ties developed with Turkey through Nato into the
more fundamental ties of political association.
It would build on the strong secular nature of Turkish public life
forged by the great Kemal Ataturk, who fought the British at
Gallipoli before leaving a legacy of modernism influential to this
day.
Turkey’s acceptance, it is felt, would erase the centuries of
conflict in which the Ottoman Empire sought to stretch its hand into
Europe and where memories of battles against the Turk still linger.
The EU, after all, is designed not to forget history but to overcome
it.
The siege of Vienna
Only recently was one such battle, the siege of Vienna in 1683,
invoked by a European commissioner to argue against Turkish entry.
“The liberation of 1683 would have been in vain,” declared Dutch
commissioner Frits Bolkenstein.
In that siege, it was the Polish King Jan Sobieski who led a force
which drove the Turks away. How appropriate, those favouring Turkish
entry now argue, that Catholic Poland and Muslim Turkey might one day
join together in the Union.
How much more compelling would be a final rapprochement between
Greece and Turkey – and a settlement in Cyprus which would obviously
have to be part of any accession agreement.
An enlargement too far?
For others, Turkey would be an enlargement too far. Turkey is not
really a European country, they argue, despite its foothold on the
European continent across the Bosphorus.
The reforms are sufficient for talks, but not yet sufficient for
membership
Your say: Should Turkey join?
Its population, already 69 million, is second only to that of
Germany, which has 82m. But projections for Turkey’s people go up and
for Germany’s go down so that by mid-century, Turkey would probably
have the largest population in the EU.
That population, it is further argued, would be mainly Muslim and
despite the influence of the secular Ataturk, the influence of the
fervent Enver Pasha might one day prevail.
Enver Pasha, one of the “Young Turks” who overthrew the remnants of
the Ottoman sultanate, had a vision of extending Turkish and Muslim
rule to the peoples of the Caucasus. During World War I, he threw his
lot in with the central powers of Germany and Austria and attacked
the Russians during a winter campaign, which proved disastrous.
The Armenian people of eastern Turkey were force-marched south and
west, in one of the earliest examples of ethnic cleansing in the 20th
Century.
But it is not the past as much as the future which worries some
modern European governments.
One basic rule of the EU is the free movement of goods and people.
The prospect of millions of poor Anatolians flooding into the EU is
one which easily raises European concerns. Restrictions on such
movement for some years might well form part of accession conditions.
The third view
There is a third view – that accession talks might not even lead to
Turkish membership.
John Palmer, political director of the European Policy Centre in
Brussels, said: “It is certain that the EU will set a date for
negotiations with Turkey at the summit in December.
“The reforms are sufficient for talks, but not yet sufficient for
membership. They will be unusual talks. Both sides agree that it will
be 15 to 20 years before a decision is required. In my opinion,
Turkey will not worry about the time. What matters is that the
process of Turkish transformation is linked to the process of
negotiation.
“The separate question is whether at the end of this, there will be a
yes decision by both sides. I do not think that there is a
pre-ordained outcome to that.”
Turkey will force the EU to debate what it is and what it wants to
be.
I first became aware that Turkey might not be a welcome member of the
European club in 1984, when Claude Cheysson, who had just ended a
spell as French foreign minister, asked a group of British
correspondents over an excellent dinner in Strasbourg: “Is Turkey
European?”
Being an accomplished diplomat, he had avoided giving a direct reply
about Turkish membership and accompanied his own question with a
shrug of the shoulders and a quizzical smile. Turkey was something to
be left for another year – or century. We moved on to the cheese.
His question has not yet been fully answered.