EU DEPUTIES REGRET SLOW PACE OF REFORM IN TURKEY

Agence France Presse — English
September 5, 2006 Tuesday 10:15 AM GMT

European Union parliamentarians deplored Turkey’s lack of progress
in implementing reforms needed to join the rich 25-nation bloc.

Before the report on Turkey’s EU membership progress was adopted in a
late night vote Monday by the assembly’s foreign affairs committee,
rapporteur Camiel Eurlings noted that "unfortunately, reforms have
clearly slowed down."

The Dutch deputy said he hoped that the government in Ankara would
see his report "as a signal and an incentive to reintroduce the
vigorous speed of reform it had shown in the year before accession
negotiations started."

Mainly-Muslim Turkey officially began EU membership talks in October
but it was warned that the process would take at least a decade and
that its accession would not be automatically guaranteed even once
it was over.

Its membership has long-proved controversial among the EU’s member
states, with some countries like Germany and Austria preferring a
"privileged partnership" with Ankara.

Turkey’s case has also been hampered by a growing "enlargement fatigue"
as the Union expanded from 15 to 25 members in 2004 and with Bulgaria
and Romania likely to join next year. Croatia and Macedonia are also
waiting in the wings.

In the report, adopted by by 53 votes in favour to 6 against with 8
abstentions, the lawmakers noted "persistent shortcomings" in reforms
in areas such as freedom of expression, religious and minority rights,
the role of the military, policing, women’s rights, trade union rights
and cultural rights.

They also urged Turkey "to take concrete steps for the normalisation
of bilateral relations" with Cyprus as soon as possible, and said that
Ankara’s recognition of the Armenian genocide should be a precondition
for membership.