THREE OUT OF FIVE TURKS NOT CONFIDENT IN EU: SURVEY

Agence France Presse — English
October 1, 2005 Saturday 10:24 AM GMT

Three out of five Turks say they do not have confidence in the European
Union, just two days before highly charged negotiations on the Muslim
state’s entry to the bloc are due to begin, according to a poll for
the liberal daily Milliyet published Saturday.

Only 17.5 percent of 1,834 people questioned said they had confidence
in the EU, highlighting a significant fall in enthusiasm for membership
over the past year.

In 2004, 67.5 percent believed Turkey should “definitely” join the
EU, compared to 57.4 percent this year, the A and G survey carried
out between September 24 and 29 showed.

Some 18.2 percent of respondents said they were indifferent to the
outcome of the entry negotiations (5.7 percent up on last year)
while 10.3 percent said they opposed integration with the bloc,
a rise of 1.6 percent since 2004.

EU foreign ministers, who disagree sharply on future relations
with Turkey, are meeting on Sunday in an 11th-hour bid to agree a
“negotiation framework” for Monday’s talks.

The meeting comes after member state Austria made its opposition
to full membership for Turkey clear and proposed an alternative
“privileged partnership”, an option rejected by 59.8 percent of those
surveyed by A and G and flatly refused by the Turkish government.

“If we fail to see the honesty we expect, Turkey’s response will
undoubtedly be very different from what has been said so far,” the
Anatolia news agency reported Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan as
saying Friday.

Some French politicians, including presidential hopeful Nicolas
Sarkozy, have also expressed doubts over full membership for
Turkey, which was an explosive issue during the French government’s
unsuccessful campaign to ratify the EU constitution in May.

However Greek Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis has urged the EU to
“maintain its credibility” and resist taking a step backwards by
opting for a “privileged partnership”.

“The EU recognised Turkey as a candidate country in 1999 without
expressing any such reservation,” he told French daily Le Figaro
in September.

In recent weeks the Turkish press has reported growing public
frustration with the EU’s hesitations over Turkish membership amid
growing pressure to recognise Cyprus and over controversial massacres
of Armenians under the Ottoman empire.

According to a smaller survey by AC Nielsen, broadcast on Friday by
the Kanal D TV station, 70 percent of Turks still back negotiations
on integration with the bloc but only 47 percent believe that they
will begin on Monday as planned.

Some 55 percent of those questioned blamed France as responsible for
stalling the talks, ahead of Germany and Britain (15 percent), Greece
(seven percent) and Austria (six percent).

Turkey first applied to join the bloc in the 1960s and entry
negotiations are expected to last at least a decade.