TURKEY-THE DOOR IS STILL OPEN
Gwynne Dyer

Trinidad & Tobago Express, Trinidad and Tobago
Sept 22 2005

The near-tie in the German election, in which Chancellor Gerhard
Schroeder came from 13 percentage points behind conservative challenger
Angela Merkel in late August to less than one point behind her by
the vote on 18 September, has thrown German politics into turmoil,
but one thing is clear. The door through which Turkey hopes to enter
the European Union, which Merkel had promised to slam shut, is still
open. The entry negotiations begin on October 3, and Turkey is still
a candidate for full membership.

Merkel launched a high-profile campaign last month to block Turkey’s
entry into the European Union, sending letters to EU leaders in other
countries asking them to offer Turkey not full membership but only
“privileged partnership”. “We are firmly convinced,” she wrote, “that
Turkey’s membership would overtax the EU economically and socially
and endanger the process of European integration.” In other words,
Turks are poor (though she did not object to other candidates like
Bulgaria and Romania that are not significantly richer), they’re
Muslim, and there are far too many of them.

It was a cynical appeal to the anti-Turkish and anti-Muslim prejudices
of German voters who are already uncomfortable with the growing
diversity of their county (about three per cent of Germany’s 80 million
people are of Turkish origin), and fear a further influx of immigrants
if Turkey joins the EU. It was also bit late in the day to raise such
objections, since Turkey has been a recognised candidate for full EU
membership for the past six years. But if Angela Merkel had become the
leader of a strong majority government in Germany, the biggest country
in the EU, the Turks would have been betrayed and rejected once again.

Turkey has tied itself into knots in order to meet the EU’s standards
for membership, and that has been a good thing for the Turks, who
now live in a far more just, equal and democratic country than they
did a decade ago. But they do feel that they have kept their side of
the bargain, and only six months ago all three of the most powerful
EU countries, Germany, France and Britain, firmly backed Turkey’s
membership.

But then came the French and Dutch votes last May and June that
rejected the proposed new EU constitution, and the whole scene
turned sour.

To make matters worse, Turkey announced that while it would sign a
customs deal opening up trade with all 25 EU members, it would still
not recognise the government of the Republic of Cyprus, one of the ten
countries that joined the EU in May, 2004. French President Jacques
Chirac promptly tried to turn that declaration into a proof of Turkish
bad faith, insisting that it “poses political and legal problems and
is not in the spirit expected of a candidate to the Union”.

Even the start of Turkey’s membership talks early next month was
looking in doubt.

Cheat the Turks on that and they would surely walk away, abandoning
the vision of a broader Europe that rises above the old mutual fear
and suspicion between Christians and Muslims, and also ending all hope
that countries east of Turkey like Georgia and Armenia might one day
qualify for EU membership. The situation looked pretty grim-and then
Angela Merkel stumbled.

She may yet end up as chancellor of Germany at the head of some
awkward three-party coalition-the outcome may not be known for a month
or more-but it would not be the kind of strong, cohesive government
that could impose a de facto German veto on Turkish membership of the
EU. And it could even be the Comeback Kid himself, Gerhard Schroeder,
a strong supporter of Turkey, who forms the next German government.

As for Cyprus, EU ambassadors agreed in Brussels last Monday that
while Ankara must eventually recognise the government of Cyprus, that
can happen at any point in the entry negotiations, which are expected
to last up to ten years. That leaves plenty of time for a settlement
that includes Turkish-Cypriots too, so Ankara will go along with it.

One more crisis has been surmounted, and the talks will begin on
October 3 as planned.

– Gwynne Dyer is a London-based

independent journalist whose articles are published in 45 countries.