TURKEY CLOSER TO DECADES-OLD EU DREAM, BUT NO ONE’S CELEBRATING
By Suzan Fraser

The Associated Press
10/04/05 08:42 EDT

ANKARA, Turkey (AP) – There were no street parties, no firework
displays. When Turkey took a huge step toward fulfilling its
decades-old dream of membership in the European Union by opening
accession talks Tuesday, no one was in the mood to celebrate.

The negotiations were meant to be a straightforward affair – all 25
EU members had agreed in December to beginning talks with Ankara on
Oct. 3. Instead, they opened only after EU ministers held painful
crisis talks Sunday and Monday in Luxembourg, and nearly foundered
as Austria insisted that Turkey be offered a lesser partnership as
an alternative to full membership. Turkey refused and said it would
prefer to walk out.

Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan described the agreement to launch
talks with predominantly Muslim Turkey as a victory over prejudice
in the mainly Christian bloc.

“We stood firm and got results,” Erdogan said. “Common sense prevailed
over prejudice. From time to time there were moments when they made
us lose our tempers, when we were made to feel really tired, when we
went through difficult moments.”

It is not unusual for Turks to take to the streets for spontaneous
street parties to celebrate sporting victories or major milestones.

Hundreds celebrated in Ankara in December when EU leaders set Oct. 3
as the date for starting entry talks.

But there were no celebrations to mark the start of the talks.

“I am not anti-EU, I want EU membership,” said Seher Besyaprak, a
24-year-old employee at an Ankara pharmaceutical company. “But Europe
has never been fair to us. We are always having to make concessions,
concessions, concessions.”

There were numerous hurdles in the final days leading up to Oct. 3.

Several countries pushed Turkey to recognize EU-member Cyprus, and
the European Parliament called on Turkey to recognize the killing of
Armenians by Ottoman Turks at the beginning of the 20th century as
genocide – further angering Turks who thought they had an agreement.

“Turkey is starting full membership talks. But it is clear that this
is not taking place in a festival atmosphere,” columnist Semih Idiz
wrote in Milliyet newspaper. “This step is unfortunately being taken
in a brokenhearted atmosphere.”

Deniz Baykal, the leader of the main opposition Republican People’s
Party, criticized the terms. He complained Turkey was treated
differently than other countries that had joined – including being
given no guarantees of joining after 10 years of talks.

“The EU approach toward Turkey is different from its approach to the
25 other members,” Baykal said. “This is cause for concern.”

Those concerns were also heard on the streets of Istanbul.

“They’re not tolerant of us,” said Ozlem Aydin, 34, who works at
a store selling Italian designer clothes in a wealthy Istanbul
neighborhood. “We can be crushed. We’ll be insulted. They’ll look
down on us. It can be bad for us.”

But Sukru Ozdemir, 50, a street vendor selling sesame-seed rolls,
said “we’re going to better days. It will be good for us. We’ve been
waiting for this.”

Turkey’s ardent striving for EU membership is the legacy of Mustafa
Kemal Ataturk, who founded the secular and modern Turkish republic
from the ashes of the Islamic Ottoman empire 82 years ago – and set
Turkey’s course toward the West. Turkey has been trying to join what
started out as the Common Market since 1963.

“We passed the most important phase on the way to reaching our 40-year
goal and the founding principles of our republic,” Erdogan said.

No one expected Europe to greet Turkey – a predominantly Muslim and
largely poor country of 70 million – with open arms. But last-minute
hurdles disheartened even the strongest EU supporters.

There were efforts “to prevent membership and make Turkey accept
several heavy conditions,” said Sami Kohen, a foreign affairs analyst
for Milliyet.

Newspapers and the stock market were upbeat. The Istanbul benchmark
stock market index, the IMKB-100, rose 2.9 percent Monday, reaching
a record 34,300 point after news of a breakthrough in Luxembourg.

Radikal newspaper printed the headlines “Happy ending: Turkey-EU at the
negotiation table,” and “The journey has begun.” Hurriyet newspaper’s
headlines read “Hello Europe,” and “Turkey’s 42-year-old EU dream
is coming true.” Ulkede Ozgur Gundem, a newspaper that supports more
rights for Kurds, said: “The EU door has opened.”

Associated Press writer Benjamin Harvey in Istanbul contributed to
this report.