German chancellor candidate will continue to fight Turkish EU membership

Agence France Presse — English
June 16, 2005 Thursday 9:42 AM GMT

BERLIN June 16 — German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder’s conservative
challenger said Thursday she would not budge on her objection to
Turkey joining the European Union if she wins a September election.

Angela Merkel told parliament that she would stand by her position
that the EU would be better served by a “privileged partnership”
with Ankara as opposed to full Turkish membership.

“We will not renounce our position and will continue to repeat that
negotiations for a privileged partnership are the best option for
integrating Turkey in Europe,” she said.

Merkel said that the fact that Turkey had still not established
diplomatic relations with Armenia or Cyprus, the latter of which
joined the EU one year ago, was a “quite catastophic situation”.

Schroeder has strongly backed full EU membership for Turkey. Ankara
is due to begin EU accession talks on October 3.

Merkel’s Christian Union bloc is leading Schroeder’s Social Democrats
in opinion polls by a double-digit margin.

The debate was the first face-to-face clash between the two since
Schroeder announced last month that he would seek early elections
following a string of drubbings for his party in state polls.