PanARMENIAN.Net

BBC: Turkey-EU Talks May Be Suspended in Autumn 2006

22.03.2006 21:21 GMT+04:00

/PanARMENIAN.Net/ The Turkey-EU talks may be suspended in autumn
2006. Unless Turkey opens its ports it will fail a review of its
compliance with the customs union and its bilateral relations with
other member states, due this autumn. Most EU diplomats and
politicians do not want talks with Turkey to collapse in acrimony.

They do want to see Turkey open its ports to Greek Cypriot vessels,
but they also want moves to resolve the Cyprus problem. But the
Cypriots have much more bargaining power vis-a-vis Turkey now they are
inside the EU, and the other EU member states much less leverage over
them. Some diplomats worry that the Cypriot strategy is to
“Europeanise” the Cyprus dispute, moving the dispute away from a UN
framework where compromise is inevitable. Meanwhile, diplomats are
searching for possible moves on northern Cyprus that could encourage
the Turks to open their ports, says BBC.